


Engraved

by aevium



Category: One Piece
Genre: Adventure, Angst, Budding Love, Friendship, Friendship/Love, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Nakamaship, Near Death Experiences, Suspense
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-11
Updated: 2014-11-11
Packaged: 2018-02-24 23:12:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 32,570
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2600027
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aevium/pseuds/aevium
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sanji’s life is threatened by a mysterious ink curse tattooed on his skin. He and the crew must then trust the ink itself to guide them towards the only person capable of saving him: a nomadic poet. </p><p>Nakamaship fic, focused on Zoro+Sanji with strong signs of ZoSan. Pre-time skip, before Franky and Brook join.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Part 1

"Can you hear me?"

He awoke to a husky voice questioning him, crackling as if being used for the first time in a long, long while. His throat parched and feeling as though it was coated in sand, he could say nothing to respond.

"You're lucky that I found you when I did. Any longer and I don't know if I would have been able to save you. You followed my directions well, you and your friend."

It was a woman. In his blurry vision he could make out the outline of her thin figure. She had unruly chocolate brown hair styled in a long pixie cut. Her skin was the beautiful hue of coffee and milk combined, under a coating of dirt and sand. He wished he could pay her these compliments, to tell her how beautiful she was, but he was far too weary.

"You're alive," she leaned down to him with a smile. When she did, he could see the fuzzy image of someone behind her, wrapped up in sandy beige robes. That tall, muscular form...the man's name was on his lips.

Suddenly he was able to focus on her face. Thick, natural eyebrows; lips which were dry but full; and eyes, brilliant green eyes which seemed to peer into his very soul. She was clad in an alluring long skirt of vibrant patterns and enrobed with deep rouge cloth. Her wooden necklaces and bracelets clacked together in song, and the many golden hoops arching up her earlobes and cartilage shimmered from firelight. She was messy and unkempt and wild, but exotic in her natural, nomadic beauty. Like a native goddess.

Then, with a subtle smile, she said: "You're alive, pirate."

He was alive. He was  _alive_.

As the goddess gently tilted a canteen past his parched lips, he couldn't help but feel water replenishing the life that was taken from him, giving him a second chance to come back to his crew alive; alive and ready to find his ocean.

**·⁞· Day One ·⁞·**

Gonka Island had been the name. An island crowded by jungles, as well as mysterious temples and ruins which had intrigued the archaeologist of the Straw Hat crew immediately. Sanji prepared their lunches for the day's adventure on the new, exciting island. Zoro and Usopp decided to stay behind and watch the ship, while Luffy, Nami, Sanji, Chopper and Robin went off to explore.

Walking through the jungle proved to be more straining than anticipated. The humidity was probably the greatest culprit for fatigue—not so much the dangerous animals or the infectious insects and plants around every twist and bend. Luffy, of course, managed to tame a tiger that had attacked them, and rode on its back with Chopper the rest of the way to their destination. Their destination being the tall temple in the centre of the island.

"It's very old," Robin's voice echoed as they entered through an elaborately carved arch made of stone. Vines crawled up the walls and poked through every possible crevice. "I wonder if there are any inhabitants on the island."

"I didn't see anything that would suggest people are here. Nothing but these ruins, but it looks like it's all abandoned," Nami said. Then, her eyes seemed to widen with a  _ka-ching_  as she clasped her hands together excitedly. "I wonder where all the treasure is!"

"I'll gladly find some jewels for you, Nami-swan!" Sanji piped in, popping up into Nami's personal space. He was promptly punched away by her fist for getting far too close.

Diligently studying the tunnel, Robin giggled at her two enthusiastic companions.

Luffy marched on in front of everyone, chanting his usual upbeat, nonsensical tune that Nami told him to cease almost every ten seconds. Chopper was with Luffy, clacking the brick floor and walls of the tunnel with a stick he'd picked up in the jungle.

Finally, they entered a large room. It seemed to be the centre of the temple, because the roof's height had them feeling like ants, stretching high above them. Sanji, Luffy and Robin held their lanterns higher to provide more light.

Chopper's voice rang out. "This is scary, I can hardly see a thing!"

"Be sure not to touch just anything. It's highly likely that there are still functioning booby traps," Robin warned.

" _Robin!"_  Chopper and Nami scolded.

"What?" she said. "I'm merely cautioning you."

Luffy of course marched on. "Booby traps? This place sounds fun! Let's explore!"

Chopper slouched as he followed his captain and, doubly, his source of light. "Usopp's lucky he stayed behind..."

"Everyone keep an eye out for expensive looking things!" Nami reminded the group.

"Navigator-san, it's especially possible that such prizes would be rigged to—"

"Doesn't matter! Grab anything shiny at all costs, everybody!"

"With pleasure, Nami-san!"

"She's a witch!" Chopper moaned, but soon squeaked when Sanji loomed over him in their beautiful navigator's defence. He was quiet after that silent threat.

Feeling like Luffy was simultaneously the safest and most dangerous companion, Chopper went off with him. Sanji stayed with the women to keep them safe, of course, and watched with a blush on his cheeks as Robin studied the carvings on the walls with the help of her lantern. Nami strayed a bit, catching sight of another entrance to a smaller room.

"Hey, there's another room over here," she announced. "Sanji-kun, bring the light over here."

"Coming Nami-san," Sanji obliged, meeting her with a few brisk strides.

She leaned forward, peering into the room as it lit up with an orange glow from Sanji's lantern. Seeing some interesting glimmers reflecting off of the light, her brown eyes widened with excited mirth. "I've got a good feeling about this room. I'm going in," she declared, fear behind her at the prospect of making a discovery that'd have her rolling in belli.

"Wait, Nami-san," Sanji stopped her. "I'll go in. I can't let you go into such a filthy room."

Nami put a hand on her hip and sighed. "All right, Sanji-kun. Make sure you pick up every last  _molecule_  of treasure, okay?"

As Sanji stepped up to the entrance of the room, he turned around briefly to blow her kisses, his lantern jangling about with his erratic movements. "I'll scour it clean for you, Nami-swan! I won't leave a speck of gold in there!"

Nami stared flatly at him, irritated. "Just go, idiot."

Sanji twisted around to the room before him. It was extremely small, but he could already see the gold shimmering from his lantern, buried in piles under various carpets and tarps. Smiling in excitement and ecstatic that he was about to make Nami  _very_ happy, Sanji lifted a tarp. It slid off to the floor and he coughed, stepping back when dust filled the limited space of the room.

"How much is there?" Nami's voice echoed behind him.

Sanji lowered his arm from his mouth and responded with a raspy throat. "It's a small room, but there's piles of it, Nami-san. I'll bring it all out. We can use these tarps to carry it all back to the ship."

"That's great!" The high pitch of her voice gave away the belli in her eyes.

And so Sanji got to work. He was pleased that there were no booby traps awaiting him for touching these treasures. For the next ten minutes he stepped to and from the room, bringing various golden objects with him and setting them on a tarp on the ground. Every time he came out with more and the pile increased in size, Nami's smile grew with it.

The room opened up a lot more without the piles of gold in there, but it still felt stuffy because of the massive amount of dust due to Sanji's rummaging. There was also a podium at the very back, in the centre. Pottery and other wooden artefacts lay about the room, as well as rolled up carpets. He heard Nami's excited chatter behind him and Robin's calm voice as he stepped in to do a final scour.

"I don't think there's anything left, Nami-san. Just some useless stones, vases, wood, and some carpets," he called out to her. He hadn't been able to see very much of the podium with all of the junk cluttering the room, but now he could see it clearly. There was a rolled up piece of paper sitting there casually. Not displayed, just laying there unceremoniously, like the podium was no different that somebody's coffee table. "And some random scroll," he added.

"Leave it then, Sanji-kun. We're gonna have loads of belli with all of this!"

"Yeah..." he mumbled, stepping up to the podium. He tilted the lantern over the surface of it with his right hand, and reached to pick up the old scroll with his left. Slipping the lantern's handle through his wrist, Sanji used both hands to unravel the parchment, his thumb brushing over a single line of calligraphy.

He was only able to read the words: " _ **With each day**_ _..."_  before the calligraphy began to emit a golden light—bright enough to render it unreadable—and Sanji felt an uncomfortable warmth crawling up and around his left forearm. "Whoa...!" he yelped, dropping the parchment and stepping back like he'd just been bitten by a viperous snake. "The hell...?"

He scrunched up the sleeves of his suit and dress shirt and rubbed the area that felt warm, just around the centre of his forearm. But there was only skin. Yet it felt like an invisible strip of sunburn coiling around his arm, tight and itchy.

Sanji looked down at the once again rolled up piece of parchment and frowned. What the fuck had that been...? About to bend down to investigate the strange phenomenon, he was cut short when Robin's voice resonated behind him.

"Something wrong, Cook-san?" she asked gently.

"Ah." Sanji straightened up, deciding to leave the shitty piece of paper on the ground. "No, nothing, Robin-chan. I don't see anything else in here that could be worth much money. Maybe we could bargain the carpets off, but they don't look like they're in good shape..."

"Leave them, Sanji-kun," Nami ordered. "This should be more than enough for a while."

"Yes, Nami-san!"

For the next half hour, Nami didn't want to leave her treasure and Sanji couldn't leave her alone. Robin explored a little more, but didn't stray too far. They felt earthquake-like rumbles and loud noises akin to thunder here and there. All of them were provoked by Luffy, they were sure. Finally their spirited captain emerged with a thoroughly frightened looking Chopper. Both of them were breathing heavily when they stopped in front of Nami, Robin and Sanji. Luffy had a head-sized green jewel settled casually under his arm.

"We saw...this  _huge gem!_  And when I took it off the thingy, this  _giant rock_  came rolling at us! And then  _huge spikes_  shot out of the ground! It was so fun!" Luffy enthusiastically explained.

Chopper immediately denied, " _It was not!_ If you didn't touch everything, we wouldn't have been almost killed eighteen times! _"_

Luffy held the large jewel up to Nami. "But look! Isn't it awesome!?"

Nami's eyes glistened as she gawked at the jewel. "It's gotta be worth a fortune!"

Luffy grinned, looking extremely proud. "We can get a bronze statue with this, can't we?"

" _No way!"_  Nami scolded. "And don't say it as if being able to get something as  _useless_  as a bronze statue is impressive!"

"But I want one, Nami! I found the gem, so I should get to choose what we do with it—!"

_Conk!_

Luffy rubbed his head as Nami swiped the jewel from him.

"I'll carry this," she declared. Robin giggled behind her.

"Are we ready to travel back to the ship, everyone?" the archaeologist questioned.

"Yeah!" Luffy agreed. "Let's go back! Zoro and Usopp must be bored."

Sanji threw one of the sacks of treasure over his shoulder and beckoned Chopper to take care of the other one in his human form. The five of them then backtracked through the tunnel to the entrance, and then ventured into the jungle once again.

They took one break to eat their lunches, though Luffy had already eaten his on the way there and mooched off of Chopper and Sanji. Sanji obviously didn't let him touch the girls' food.

By the time they got back to the ship, Sanji felt very fatigued, more than he'd like to admit. He supposed he wasn't used to such stifling humidity. All he needed right now was a shower and some cold, refreshing water down his throat.

They were greeted by Usopp and Zoro at the side of the ship, who rolled down the rope ladder for them.

"Whoa! Looks like it was a successful trip!" Usopp exclaimed as he helped Sanji set it down. "You brought back so much gold!"

"Yeah," Sanji replied. "It was packed into this small little room. Luffy found a huge jewel, too."

"Really!?" was all Usopp said before he zoomed over to Luffy to check out his find.

Sanji watched him go before rubbing his sweaty forehead and scalp, turning his gaze back down to the gold on Merry's deck, sprawled out atop the brown tarp he'd used to carry it. He sighed, his eyes feeling heavy. He let Nami and Robin have the bathroom to wash up before him, and in the meantime he planned out their meal for tonight and prepared some of the ingredients.

Finally when the bathroom was free, he went in, turned the showerhead on and undressed. As he stepped into the tub, Sanji felt a heavy wave of fatigue bog him down. He braced himself on the tub, then felt that faint sensation of sunburn and noticed a golden glow. He looked down and caught the calligraphy coiling around his left forearm in a perfect circle. Eyes widening in shock, he shot his forearm closer to his face to inspect the words.

He only managed to catch: " _ **With each**_ _..."_  before their golden luminescence faded back to his normal skin.

"What the...?" he mumbled, utterly confused. What the fuck was going on? Why were there words on his skin? That parchment—just what kind of magic was this? And what did it mean for him? Somehow the calligraphy on that parchment had crawled onto his own skin. As crazy as it was, there was no other conclusion to be made. He just wished, when it glowed, it would give him enough time to read it. But it was difficult to read much of anything with the letters glowing to begin with. Was this dangerous...? Or was it just some harmless, funky glow-tattoo he would have to live with?

Unsettled, Sanji stepped into the shower to cleanse the weariness from his body.

He would have to talk to Chopper about it. But for now, how could he explain it with the skin of his arm looking normal as ever?

But Sanji could feel it there, embedded and engraved on his skin. What did it mean?

* * *

For the rest of the day, Sanji's attention was spent on dinner for the crew and cleaning up afterwards. And by the time he was done all of this, he didn't even want to worry about whatever shit was going on with his arm. He just wanted to sleep. Usopp was on watch tonight, and so Sanji, by routine, gave him hot cocoa for the night and then crawled under deck.

Both Luffy and Zoro were snoring in the two hammocks when Sanji climbed down. Chopper was sleeping peacefully on the couch-chair by the cabinet—all the more reason for Sanji to not bother the reindeer. The full couch was free for the blond's taking. He took off his belt and suit jacket and set them in the cabinet before collapsing stomach-first on the couch. He melted into it, feeling so utterly drained by today's events.

He was asleep in mere minutes.

But soon, he awoke again with a shiver. He didn't feel at all replenished, but what woke him up was a stinging sensation on his arm, and a stifled light emitting from beneath his sleeve. He started, and sat up on one elbow, facing the back of the couch. Pulling down the sleeve, this time he was unable to catch anything before the words faded, leaving him in darkness. Furrowing his brows as fatigue swept over him once again, he couldn't quite bring himself to care and plonked his head back onto the cushion.

He would figure it out tomorrow. For now, sleep.

**·⁞· Day Two ·⁞·**

"You look worn, Cook-san."

Sanji turned to Robin in shock from his spot at the sink. Breakfast was over and it was time to clean up. "Oh, do I, Robin-chan...?"

"You do. Did you not sleep well?" the dark haired woman questioned.

"I slept the whole night..." Sanji responded, his thoughts drifting off to his memory of last night. He'd pretty much slept like a log. Then he realized that Robin was acting worried about him. "Thank you for your concern, Robin-chwan! Maybe I slept a little too well, but I feel fine!"

Robin tilted her coffee mug against her lips, about to take a sip. "Indeed. Sometimes sleeping too deeply can make a person feel groggy in the morning."

Sanji rubbed his hair and smiled at her. "Exactly. I think that's what happened. I'll be fine by lunch time! Robin-chan is so smart..."

Robin released the mug from her lips, holding it in two hands. "Until then, would you like me to help with the dishes?"

"Of course not, Robin-chan! You go out and enjoy the nice day with Nami-san!" Sanji encouraged, bringing his hands up in front of him. "I'll bring out some punch for you soon," he added with a smile.

Robin set her mug down on the counter beside the sink. "All right," she agreed. "Thank you, Cook-san."

"My pleasure, Robin-chan!"

The door closed, and Sanji was left alone in the galley with his dishes. He sighed, rolling up his sleeves to get to work. When he put his hands in the soapy water, Sanji noticed a faint marking around his left arm. He brought it out of the water and up to his face to inspect it further. The water dripped down his skin as he tried to decipher the marks, but it was impossible. They were far too faded. It just looked like a blur of figures circling around his forearm. But just yesterday it had been invisible. Was it appearing on his skin now?

He decided that this was a probably good thing. If it could be seen, it could be better diagnosed. Maybe if he just waited until it was more noticeable—and hopefully readable—he could show Chopper. Right now it just looked like a subtle rope bruise.

By the time Sanji finished washing everything that morning, he was already beat. He drifted over to the table and took a seat. Maybe if he relaxed a little before lunch time his body would return to its normal energy levels.

Sanji pulled out his cigarettes and lit up. Inhaling, he left the cigarette dangling out of his lips and brought his arm up to him again. The blond twisted it around, squinting in hopes of making sense of the shapes, but to no avail. He sighed, resigned, and stretched his long legs out under the table, crossing one over the nook of his opposing foot.

It was then that he remembered his promise of drinks for the ladies, and with a curse aimed at himself for letting something so important slip his mind, Sanji stood again and got to work.

* * *

As everyone inhaled their dinner, Zoro ate tentatively, distracted by the cook. There was something...off about him. His ridiculously graceful stride was lacking, and he was less enthusiastic with the girls. Less aggressive with the men, too. He was also paler with a dazed, out-of-it expression and his eyes looked as burnt out as one of the stubs in his ashtray, more or less.

Was the idiot sick, or what?

The crew cleared out after they were thoroughly stuffed, but Zoro stayed behind for some booze. Sanji was apparently aware of this.

"If you want your precious sake, help me clear off the table, shithead. And dry," Sanji ordered.

Zoro grumbled, but obliged. He didn't want any petty arguments tonight. Or maybe he had pity on the cook who apparently wasn't in the best shape. As usual when forced to cooperate with the cook like this, Zoro did his work in silence. Quick glances over to Sanji had Zoro noticing just how spaced out the guy looked. He ignored it dispassionately—at least until the damn cook dropped a plate back in the sink with a loud clatter.

"Damn..." the blond mumbled under his breath.

Finally intrigued beyond his typical silence—the stupid cook was  _really_  out of it—Zoro threw a comment his way. "You look like shit, Cook."

"Mind your own business, shitty swordsman," Sanji shot back. His venomous tone wasn't as potent as usual, Zoro noted.

"You sick or something?" Zoro pressed further.

"You want me to spit in your next meal? Piss off," Sanji retorted. Damn marimo thought he was being clever with his observations or some shit? Sanji scoffed at the thought. "I'm not sick," he added for good measure.

"If that's what you wanna tell yourself." A smirk.

"Oh?" Sanji was egged on now and he shoved the last plate into Zoro's chest. "And what does this make you? Worried?"

Zoro scoffed. "Ha!" He dried the plate and added it to the stack on the counter. "I wouldn't give a shit if you dropped dead right here and now."

Zoro casually walked past Sanji as if his words had been like any other insult, but Sanji felt a little more struck by them this time. Anger pulsating in his veins while Zoro carelessly reached for a bottle from the wine rack, Sanji retaliated: "Emotionless assholes wouldn't give a shit, would they?"

The swordsman already had the bottle popped open and on his lips when he paused. "What was that?"

"I'm not repeating it," Sanji said, turning to the dishes that he still needed to put away. "You've got your booze. Get the fuck out of my kitchen."

Zoro merely gave him a mocking chuckle. "Fine." No need for the damn cook to get all touchy about it.

He promptly stepped out and shut the door. Then he walked to the railing straight ahead and looked up to the crow's nest. It was his watch tonight.

* * *

It had to be close to midnight that night when Zoro's peace and quiet was disturbed by somebody crawling up deck. He peered over the side of the crow's nest and saw Sanji climbing to his feet. It was when the cook wobbled, nearly falling onto the deck, that Zoro felt a genuine pang of concern. What the hell was going on with him?

Zoro cursed to himself when he began the descent down from the crow's nest. When he reached the main deck, Sanji was at the other side of it with his lighter out, which was nothing strange—other than the fact that he was holding the small flame up to his arm like some psycho.

"What the hell are you doing?" Zoro broke into the silent air.

Sanji seemed to jump, but then calmed, not even turning around to give Zoro a single look. "Nothing that concerns a moron like you," he said harshly. "Go back up there and do your job."

"Well if you didn't come out here and—"

Zoro stopped talking when Sanji's arm started glowing, and it sure as hell didn't come from the cook's lighter. The darkness of night in the middle of the ocean made it a pretty obvious phenomenon. The luminescence faded to nothing, and then Sanji slumped over the side of the Merry like he'd been struck by a fainting spell.

"What..." Zoro said, shocked.

"Shit..." Sanji cursed with a strained breath. So his theory was confirmed. Every time this damn mark glowed, it made him feel weary. And sleep didn't seem to be doing him much good anymore. What the hell was this...?

"Did your arm just  _glow_...?" Zoro asked plainly. "What the fuck was that?"

Sanji, still leaning over the gunwale, shot a glare over his shoulder. "None of your damn business, okay?" he spat. Twisting around to get out of Zoro's presence—the  _one_  guy he didn't want to deal with right now—Sanji covered his arm and briskly walked past his shipmate.

But Zoro caught the blond with a hand to his shoulder. Sanji tensed up, clearly agitated. "Sorry, Cook. Don't see shit like that every day. What the hell is up with your arm?"

Sanji shrugged out of Zoro's grip, but refused to face him. "Something I picked up from that island a couple days back. I'm going to talk to Chopper about it tomorrow. You happy?"

Zoro didn't respond. He simply stared at Sanji's back, contemplating.

"You're an odd guy for someone who doesn't care if I live or die," Sanji mumbled, acid on his tongue.

"Still sore about that?" Zoro calmly jabbed.

"Shut up." Sanji strode across the deck towards the hatch leading to the boys' room. "Go back up and watch the damn ship, lazy asshole."

Still relatively shocked by what he'd just witnessed, Zoro let the cook climb down the hatch in peace. Sighing, he scratched his head and began walking back to make his climb up the crow's nest. He supposed it was best to leave it in Sanji's hands. The cook said that he was going to see Chopper about it, anyway.

Though he wasn't quite sure what kind of treatment Chopper would prescribe for a glowing arm. Maybe some kind of balm or cream...?

As he climbed, Zoro tried to shake off the unsettling twist in his gut.

**·⁞· Day Three ·⁞·**

That morning, Sanji was in the bathroom washing his face when he noticed his mark was more distinct and had more clarity. It was still a washed out shade, but it was crisper and held enough saturation for him to make out the words if he squinted. He dried his face and hands off with a towel and then studied his arm under the direct lighting of the room.

The words were silently on his lips as he twisted his arm in awkward positions to read the mark. His mouth parted in shock when he finished, eyes hardened in consternation, heart racing in trepidation. "This has to be a joke..."

But it would explain why he woke up this morning feeling even worse than yesterday. Like sleep was doing nothing to rejuvenate him.

"Shit," he cursed and made quick strides out of the bathroom, even if the sudden movement had him nearly stumbling against the doorframe.

It was time to see Chopper.

* * *

_**With each day forth thy life shall wane; on the tenth there shall be none left in thy veins.** _

"I've never seen something like this before..." Chopper admitted, poking and prodding at Sanji's mark. "Sanji, you got this from touching some paper?"

"A scroll back at the last island, yeah," Sanji emphasized, his brows drawn together. "It's been two days. If this is true..."

"You'd have eight days left, including today," Chopper finished. "And you've really been feeling more tired lately?"

"Yeah," Sanji nodded. "I feel like my energy is disappearing. Sleep doesn't help." He paused, and then remembered something very important. "This thing glows, too, and whenever it does, I feel worse."

"Mm," Chopper hummed, taking in this strange and abstract information. This wasn't something in the medical realm, this was something else. "How often does it glow?"

Sanji sat on that question for a bit as he tried to recall. "I'd say...maybe five times a day." Chopper simply nodded, looking concerned. "I think it's the real deal..." the cook added quietly.

"Why didn't you tell me sooner?" the reindeer asked, poking Sanji's arm a little rougher than necessary.

Sanji flinched from Chopper's harsh prod. "The ink wasn't visible until today. I didn't know it could be life threatening until I read it this morning," he explained.

"I could try administering some kind of stimulant. It might make you feel more energized but..." Chopper shook his head, realizing his uselessness in this situation. "Giving you energy and giving you life are two separate things. Honestly, Sanji...this sounds like some kind of magical curse. I don't know how to cure something like this..."

Sanji frowned when the reindeer doctor looked close to tears. He put a hand atop Chopper's pink hat. "It's not your fault, Chopper. This isn't exactly your expertise."

Chopper sniffed and gazed up at the blond with big, worried eyes. "There has to be  _something_ ," he continued. "If we just knew more about it, we could figure out a solution."

Sanji nodded, agreeing. Well, currently their best bet for information was... "Robin-chan might know something."

"Ah!" Chopper straightened, his eyes suddenly gleaming with renewed hope. "You're right! Robin would probably know something about cursed scrolls, wouldn't she? I'll call her in, err..." he paused amidst his scurry towards the galley door. Then he turned back to Sanji, appearing conflicted. "Should I call everybody in, Sanji?"

The blond nodded. "It's probably best if everyone knows. The more of us involved, the faster we'll get to the bottom of this, hopefully."

Minutes later had the crew filing in one by one. Sanji shifted uncomfortably. He never really liked being the centre of attention—well, not unless he was the focal point of many beautiful women. But having all of his crewmates' eyes on him for something like this was...discomforting.

"Sanji," Luffy began, direct and serious. In that tone, the boy always became a true captain to the crew. "Chopper said something's wrong?"

Sanji closed his eyes, lighting up a cigarette with a disgruntled frown. "Yeah, Luffy..." he paused, taking in nicotine to smooth out what felt like knots in his nerves. "This is gonna sound kind of crazy, but...well, what isn't crazy on this ocean? On Gonka, when I was grabbing gold for Nami-san, I found a scroll in the same room. I opened it and it...glowed, then it somehow...attached to me." He lifted up his arm and pointed to his faint markings, sleeve already rolled down from Chopper's previous inspection. "It's been appearing more on my skin since that day, and today I was finally able to read it."

"What does it say?" Nami asked, sounding worried.

"Ah, Nami-san, your selfless concern makes my heart feel like it'll burst—!"

The orange-haired woman held up a fist with a menacing expression. "What. Does. It. Say, Sanji-kun?" This was no time for his silly antics.

Sanji nodded and held his arm up, palm facing him, and squinted to read the words as he twisted his limb around. He read: "With each day forth thy life shall wane; on the tenth there shall be none left in thy veins."

"Hold on," Usopp said. "It's saying you'll die in ten days...?"

Sanji nodded, looking resigned. "Seems like it." He casually exhaled, taking the cigarette from his mouth.

"Wait," Usopp spoke again, his voice shaking a little with worry. "How do we know it's true? What kind of proof is there?"

"As the words say," Sanji began, his tone serious, "I've been losing my strength ever since I got this mark. Also, it glows, and when it does, I feel weaker. Seems to be true, based on how I've felt." The cook then made a quick glance at Zoro, who was stern as ever with his arms crossed. Sanji gestured over to the swordsman. "The Marimo knows. He saw it light up last night."

Everyone turned to the green-haired man, who calmly nodded his response.

"We were at Gonka two days ago," Nami reflected. "That means you have—"

"Eight days," Luffy finished Nami's observation. "Sanji has eight days left." Everyone was silent as Luffy stood proud and stern.

Their captain continued, "That means...we have eight days to make sure Sanji lives."

Sanji smirked around his cigarette. Everyone else seemed to also notice the tense air lifting after Luffy's anchoring words. Leave it to Luffy to see things in a more positive light.

Chopper spoke up. "I can't do anything for him, either. It's not any normal sickness; it's some kind of curse. And I'm worried about administering a stimulant because I don't want to trick his body into thinking it can do what it normally can. He might overexert himself, and for all I know, that could give him less time."

"Don't we have anything to work with here?" Nami asked, her fingers clasping her chin in thought. "Isn't there any kind of starting point? We know next to nothing about why this happened, let alone how to stop it."

"Actually, I might be able to help there. If a little," Robin cut in, finally joining in on the discussion. "In the interest of safety for my archaeological pursuits, I've come to learn from various sources that curses  _are_  scattered around the world. Though, they're said to be somewhat obscure. Some of them are known to appear in locations that are under my scope, such as the temple we explored days ago. I've heard about explorers and archaeologists who have picked up some rather nasty curses amidst their expeditions. I'd also be willing to guess that adventurers aren't the only ones who've suffered this fate, and that curses can exist in populous areas of the world as well. This is merely what I've been warned about as an archaeologist, and it seems that Cook-san's curse is a result of this."

Usopp frowned. This was an incredibly stressful situation. He stepped forward. "But, this doesn't help the case at hand. Sanji's going to die in eight days and there's nothing we can do about it!?"

"I'm merely informing you of what I know, Longnose-kun," Robin stated calmly. "And what I know is this: these curses aren't any kind of magic foreign to us. I'm certain the culprit is a Devil Fruit user."

"So, what?" Luffy chimed in. "We find the bastard and get him to take away the curse, right?"

"It's not that simple, Luffy." Zoro's voice after his long silence was strong and piercing, even as he spoke softly. "The Cook has eight days. How are we supposed to find this guy in that amount of time?"

"Ah..." Luffy frowned, understanding Zoro's point. He looked to Sanji, who was staring at the floor with a hardened expression, fingers encircling his cigarette. "But we have to find him. Sanji won't be able to cook for us anymore if we don't. He won't be able to find All Blue if we don't."

Sanji's teeth clenched around the filter of his cigarette at that.

Luffy stepped in front of Sanji, and then turned to study the rest of his crew. "We can't let our nakama die!"

"It's impossible, Luffy!" Sanji broke in, glaring at Luffy's back. The captain turned around to face him. "Eight days...it's not enough time. Even if we had known from the beginning, ten days wouldn't have been enough either. Tracking somebody down takes a lot of time. Sailing takes time, too. Meeting someone face to face after all that...it also takes time. Time isn't something we've got, here, Captain."

Luffy's eyes were blistering with rage. "Then what are we supposed to do!?" he yelled. "Let you  _die!?"_  Everyone stared downcast in response to Luffy's booming voice practically shaking the walls of the galley. Luffy hated helpless situations. He didn't  _believe_  in helpless situations.

Sanji stared into the intensity of Luffy's eyes with rivalling pertinacity. "This is the situation. I've got no clue what we can do about it."

Luffy's intensity flickered at that, and coming back to reality, he leaned away from Sanji with a less aggressive stance. The air was heavy and thick then, fogged up with an uneasiness that undoubtedly exuded from this gridlock of a situation.

Nami looked about ready to say something when the writing on Sanji's arm glowed. He expected a bout of fatigue, but it didn't come. Instead he felt the ink on his arm...was it  _shifting?_  He watched in sheer amazement as the glowing ink seemed to converge into little blobs, and then reshape into letters. Different words. These were different words!

"It's changing!" Sanji announced. "This is new..."

The crew watched, astounded, as Sanji's tattoo shone golden and morphed.

"Whoa!" said Usopp.

"It's glowing!" Luffy noted, leaning over and bracing his palms on his thighs to observe it further.

The mark faded back to its original washed out hue, and Sanji had to push Luffy's face—which was far too close—out of the way to properly read it. Even the handwriting was different—more scribbled and less calligraphic. Everyone gathered close as Sanji read the new words aloud.

" _Hello,_ " he read, brows furrowing. This was far too freaky. " _The ink is visible, so you can read it now, can't you? It's unfortunate, but I'm responsible for your curse, in a way."_

Understanding the situation and their incredible luck, Nami was quick to ask the cook: "Sanji-kun, is there pen and paper in here?"

"Ah, yes, in the second drawer there, Nami-san," Sanji informed, pointing to the set of drawers in question attached to the counters.

"Read it again, Sanji-kun," Nami instructed, pen and paper fetched and ready. "I'm going to record everything."

Sanji repeated the message and Nami scribbled it down. Then, they all stood in anticipation, waiting for more.

"This is almost too good to be true," Usopp broke the silence. "I wonder if this person can be trusted..."

"Whoever it is, they're responsible," Zoro pointed out. "This is exactly who we want to find. Whether it's bad news or not, we don't have a choice."

"Y-yeah..." Usopp reluctantly agreed.

A minute later, the ink glowed and shifted again. Sanji read the next message: " _I'm the possessor of the Ink Ink Fruit. I can communicate with you like this. You must trust me, there's much to explain."_

Nami's scribbling proceeded, and for several minutes they waited for more information. Again, it came.

" _I can save you, just follow my instructions. I'm on an island called Imad. Head to the only port town there, Marwa."_ Then, Sanji spelled out the locations, "Nami-san, that's I-M-A-D, and M-A-R-W-A."

"Got it, Sanji-kun. Thank you." More scribbling.

Several minutes later, Sanji read out the next message:  _"Don't hesitate, you don't have much time. I hope you're close enough to make this journey."_

The final message came quicker this time around.  _"And last but not least: please trust me. I will communicate more with you later on."_

"Okay," Nami said. "I wrote it all down. I'm going to look up that island. I hope it's not too far away..." The red-head was out the door in seconds to check her maps and atlases.

The message on his arm illuminated again and morphed, but this time it simply went back to the curse that was originally written there, which felt unpleasant to Sanji.

"It's very fortunate that this person seems willing to help you," Robin stated. "I was worried that this Devil Fruit user would be wicked. Hopefully we aren't betrayed."

Usopp shot his hands straight up in the air and shrieked fearfully. "Don't say that, Robin! I  _just_  got over the idea of betrayal!"

"You dork," Zoro spoke through his teeth. "I  _just_  told you, we don't have a choice."

"Zoro's right," Luffy acknowledged, putting his hands on his waist. "And if Inky betrays us, we'll just beat his ass and make him cure Sanji, right? No big deal."

Usopp, Sanji and Zoro all looked at Luffy with a dull expression. "Inky...?" they mumbled in unison.

"Yeah!" Luffy nodded with a bright smile. "That's my nickname for this guy! Inky!" He laughed absurdly at that until Usopp zoomed over and smacked him upside the head.

"This is a serious situation, you know!?"

The two of them struggled humorously in the background while Sanji caught Zoro's eyes. The man was glaring at him, he'd felt it for a while, but when his eyes made contact with Zoro's, the swordsman turned away. Zoro then callously ambled over to the wall by the door and leaned his back against it, closing his eyes.

Sanji ignored that lout and looked down at Chopper from his sitting position on the tabletop. The reindeer was standing firm and looked visibly upset. Sanji popped the cigarette stub out of his mouth and squished it into his ashtray on the table. Then, he addressed: "Chopper, you're quiet."

"Sanji..." Chopper gazed up at him with watery eyes. "Don't go out of your way like you usually do, okay? Make sure to get lots of rest, and drink lots of water and eat well to keep yourself healthy, and – and also, tell me if you're ever uncomfortable, I can probably prescribe something to help! Maybe if you don't stress yourself, you'll have more time—"

"Chopper," Sanji cut him off with a smirk and put his palm on the reindeer's hat. Chopper was forced to look downwards with the action. "Thanks. I feel fine for now, but I'll try to take it easy, okay?"

Chopper's circular eyes glimmered, elated. Then he wriggled around in his usual dance that did nothing to hide his affection. "Don't thank me, dammit! I'll sedate you if I have to, you know?"

Zoro opened his eyes when he heard the thump of Nami's shoes scrambling up the staircase. Moments later, she barged into the galley, panting.

"Usopp, take the helm! Turn hard to starboard!" she ordered. Then, with a bright smile that functioned to relieve everyone, she informed. "Imad Island is a five day sail from here."

There were smiles and sighs of relief all around, and the foggy tenseness of the air cleared up immediately. Even though there were still more obstacles to be encountered, the fact that they could make it to the island on time was a small victory to them all.

Luffy laughed excitedly, then threw his hands up above him and announced:

" _Yosh!_   _Set course for Imad Island!"_

* * *

Usopp peered into the galley, and when the door creaked, he flinched and hid. Sanji's voice rang out from behind it.

"What do you want, Usopp?"

"Err..." the nervous sharpshooter leaned over again. "Uh, Sanji..."

"Come in if you wanna say something, geez," Sanji ordered, sounding exasperated. He looked exasperated, too.

Usopp slipped inside and closed the door. He looked down to the floor, but felt Sanji's eyes on him.

"Why are you acting like you deserve to get the shit kicked outta you?" Sanji asked with a smirk.

"I...!" Usopp started, all confidence with his finger pointing forward, but then he reclined. Inhaling, he looked Sanji directly in the eyes. The worn look in the cook's eyes and the darkness underneath them gave him renewed confidence. "Sanji, aren't you tired...? I–I mean you've been cooking all day, and cleaning..."

Sanji let his cigarette smoulder as he stared, curious. His hands remained in the soapy water while he translated the meaning behind Usopp's words: concern. Usopp really was a good guy, wasn't he? "For now, I'm just a little tired. This is my job, Usopp. I'll do it as long as I'm able."

"I see..." Usopp said, staying in his spot at the entrance to the galley. He wasn't sure he felt comfortable with that response. Shouldn't Sanji be relaxing like Chopper said? Didn't he realize that everyone was scared for him? "Aren't you...scared?"

"Usopp, what—"

"Because you can't tell me you're not. That's just bullshit." Usopp wouldn't let Sanji pull any tough-guy nonsense on him. He was used to fear, real fear, and there was a benefit to feeling such a thing. If Sanji didn't realize that, then—

"I am." Sanji gazed down at his arm, half-emerged in soapy water. He stared at his curse. It felt like he was shaking from the fear of not knowing when that infernal mark would create another lightshow and suck more of his life away. "I'm scared," he admitted. "It wouldn't be normal if I wasn't. But..." he said, frowning. "If I give into it...that fear isn't going to do anything but kill me faster. Resign me to my fate. That's why I'm doing the things that I'm used to. It helps me to ignore that feeling, even if it's still there."

Usopp nodded, clenching his fists. He supposed if Sanji kept that fear inside of him, it would preserve a primal drive to keep on living. He wanted Sanji's fear of death to keep him living at all costs, even at the worst of times which he knew were impending.

"You wanna help dry?" Sanji offered, breaking the silence.

Usopp straightened up. Then he smiled, walking over to the counter to take a spot beside Sanji. He determinedly grabbed a towel. "I'll grace you with my story of how Captain Usopp and his 8,000 followers survived an attack of nearly twice as many men! And giants! Giants were involved!"

"Heh," Sanji chuckled, smirking around his cigarette. He supposed Usopp keeping him company with his stories would curb away some of his fatigue.

**·⁞· Day Four ·⁞·**

Sanji awoke late that morning, which was a first for him in a long time. Groggy and feeling as though not even a fragment of the weight from yesterday's stresses had relieved off him, he slipped off the couch akin to how honey would ooze from the scones of its dipper.

It felt like he was borderlining on sleep deprivation, here, which was totally unfair because clearly he was snoozing even more than usual.

Yet even though he'd woken up late for his morning routine today, he was still ahead of the crowd. In the boys' room, he was surrounded by the snores of Usopp, Luffy, Zoro and Chopper. Sanji rubbed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose to ward off what felt like an incoming headache. He walked over to gather fresh clothes from the cabinet. As he began to get changed, the ink on his arm illuminated and he had to grab onto a shelf in the cabinet to keep himself upright.

Exhaling harshly and cursing, he took a short breather and then continued putting on his pants, doing his best to ignore the dizzy spell he was experiencing. Sanji slipped on his tie and fastened it up nice and taut and straight. He wasn't going to let some fucking magic ink wipe the floor with him just yet.

He managed to climb up to the hatch with only minor fatigue, and hastily swung it open. The crisp morning air was instantly refreshing, and there was a bit of a fog which somehow made it feel even more rejuvenating. Being holed up under deck was far too stifling at times.

Sanji took a quick shower in the bathroom and when he finished, he wiped away the fog on the mirror to have a look at himself. Even after a refreshing shower, there were still some nasty looking bags under his eyes and his skin was ghostly. Dammit. It was one thing when he had injuries or bruises that he could hide, but another when he looked like downright death. He already knew the crew would be questioning him today. To avoid this, Sanji made it his personal goal to try and act as normal as possible.

He looked at his mark. It was a little darker today, as he'd anticipated. He got dressed, wiped the bathroom down of its condensation—it was bad for the wood of the ship—and headed for the galley to get breakfast started.

When he entered the galley, he was surprised to find Robin there brewing coffee.

"Good morning, Cook-san," she politely greeted. Then she gestured towards the coffee brewer. "Some coffee to wake you up this morning?"

"Ah..." was all that came out of Sanji. There were so many things he wanted to correct about this scenario. "No...or I mean, yes, Robin-chan, but I'll get it. You don't need to – didn't need to—"

"Nonsense, Cook-san," she cut him off with a small, pleasant smile. "The coffee is almost ready. I'll simply pour you a cup."

Sanji had one hand in front of him but he lowered it down to his side and nodded. He walked over to the fridge to gather his ingredients for breakfast. "Did you have a good sleep?" he asked the archaeologist, making conversation, hoping to divert her attention away from the fact that he was busying himself with preparing a meal.

"Actually, I didn't sleep much," she answered. "I took over Swordsman-san's watch. That was his second night in a row up there. It's a bit cruel of him to do that to himself. And I was wide awake, doing research, so I figured why not create a solution for the both of us?"

Sanji laid out his cutting board and began chopping. He mulled her words over. Zoro doing two shifts in a row? What was  _that_  about? But more importantly: "You're not too tired, Robin-chan?"

"A bit," she admitted. "But I'm rather used to it." She poured two cups of coffee and asked, "How do you like your coffee?"

Sanji paused his dicing for a moment. "Two sugars, one milk. Thank you, Robin-chan."

Robin nodded accordingly. "By the way, Cook-san, last night I dug through my books since I vaguely recalled reading something about your situation in one of them. I would've started with the Encyclopaedia of Known Devil Fruits but unfortunately we don't have one on board, something I've been hoping to change."

"Ah, yeah," Sanji lit up. "I looked through one of those when I was a kid, but I was only interested in a couple fruits...so I don't remember what was said about this ink one, or if it was listed at all."

"I see," Robin nodded. "But I did find something from a historian's autobiography, and he didn't write much more than we already know. However he did mention hearing rumours that this power comes from a Logia type fruit." She paused for a moment, sliding Sanji's coffee over to him on the counter. He thanked her and she continued. "If this is indeed the case, it could explain a lot of things. Why the user is able to control on the ink on your arm to communicate, for one."

"Because this ink is a part of the user's body..." Sanji realized.

"Precisely, Cook-san," Robin confirmed. "And furthermore, 'Inky'—as Captain-san so eloquently dubbed him—might be able to sense your life force and your location, if only vaguely, since you're both connected. Also, I gathered from yesterday that 'Inky' might also know your curse, since 'Inky' seemed aware that you don't have much time. Maybe it's possible to sense the separated ink in enough detail to visualize the letters on your skin and read them. In fact, I wonder if 'Inky' sensed you the moment you got cursed. It's just my theory, of course. But I spent all night thinking about it. What I've yet to understand is this person's intentions, but I suppose we'll have to find out."

"It's an amazing theory, Robin-chan," Sanji said in awe. "Your intelligence is so stunning..."

The astute woman giggled. "Why thank you, Cook-san."

"I'll keep it all in mind," Sanji said, taking a sip of his coffee. "Thank you for your hard work, Robin-chan. And the coffee."

"It's no problem at all," she responded warmly, walking to the door with her fingers cradling a warm mug. Then she stopped and turned. "Cook-san..." She already knew his answer, but it didn't hurt to ask. "You won't be needing help with breakfast?"

"No thank you, Robin-chan. It's a simple meal. Just omelettes and some fruit."

Robin blessed him with another one of her beautiful little smiles before leaving him to his work. He sighed, took another sip of coffee and then picked up his knife.

* * *

It was mid-afternoon when Nami, Usopp and Chopper stormed into the galley with equally worried expressions. It caught the cook off-guard, who'd been leaning back against the counter with a cigarette, planning out his afternoon snacks for the crew.

"Sanji-kun." Nami practically had hazard signs plastered all over her body with that dangerous aura.

"Yes, Nami-san!" The cook jumped out of his slouched position in milliseconds.

"Sit down," she ordered, pointing to the table.

"Uh..." He glanced over to it, looking confused.

" _Sit."_

"Okay!"

He sat, and soon the three of them were looking down on him, arms crossed with stern faces. How the tiny reindeer managed to look like he was looming over him as well, Sanji didn't understand by any known laws of the universe.

Sanji scratched his head, looking positively innocent. "What...?"

Nami grabbed Sanji's left arm by the wrist. She rolled down his sleeve and pointed to his mark.

"Ahh, Nami-san's warm touch is so splendid—"

"Can it!" The fiery red-head would not take any of this fool's crap today. "You see this mark? Do you?" she interrogated.

"Yes..."

"This is taking your life as we speak! And this..." she gestured to the kitchen with a flat hand palm up. "...isn't mandatory for you in your condition. Got it, Sanji-kun?"

Sanji stared at her dumbly, surprised.

Chopper spoke up then, sounding determined. "We're worried about you! I told you not overexert yourself, Sanji, or I would sedate you!" It was a rather hilarious contrast when a massive syringe magically appeared in the cute little reindeer's hoof.

Sanji shook his hands in front of him. "No, no, don't sedate me..." he said with nervous laughter.

The syringe's tip prodded at Sanji's leg in warning. "I will!"

Sanji responded aggressively, fangs and all. " _Don't!_  I'll roast you, shitty venison!"

"Ahh! Scary!" Chopper scurried behind Usopp, clutching his trousers and hiding backwards, of course.

Usopp watched as Sanji's terrifying expression went back to perturbed. "You've been working all day. Yesterday too, and the days before that," he pointed out.

"We're worried is all, Sanji-kun," Nami explained. "You don't need to go out of your way. I can cook, the rest of these idiots can clean. Robin has an interesting recipe she says she wants to try, too."

"Nami-san, the fact that you and Robin-chan are concerned makes me happy, but..." Sanji ran a hand through his hair. "I'm fine, for now. Just tired. I'll let everyone take over when I can't do it anymore. But right now, as long as I can...I want to cook for everyone."

Nami looked like she was forcing back the devil's rage in her blood at that moment, but then she sighed and put a hand to her brow. "Idiot," she scorned. "So damn stubborn."

Sanji laughed. "I'm sorry, Nami-san."

"When I say everyone is worried, I mean everyone, you know?" Nami continued. "Even Zoro..."

Those words shook Sanji a little. Even Zoro, who never gave a shit about him, huh? That was a laugh. Of course he would never respond like that to Nami. But he didn't know what else to say, so he said nothing. And before anyone could break his silence, he felt that strange warmth on his arm and it was lighting up.

At first he prepared himself for another energy drain, but it didn't come. Did that mean...? The ink formed into blobs and transformed into new text.

"Sanji, is it...?" Chopper watched in awe.

"I'll get the paper," Nami said, rushing to the drawer.

"What does it say?" Usopp asked.

"It says..." Sanji read carefully, " _There might be a problem. There's a lot to explain, but I don't know if I'll be able to meet you at Marwa."_

Some minutes and scribbling later, the mark glowed and changed again. " _You should still dock at Marwa. I'm at Ruh Temple in the desert, trapped inside by sandstorms."_

" _You might have to meet me here if the storms persist and I run out of supplies. I'm sorry to have complicated our meeting."_

" _I have some advice. When you reach Imad, you can use the ink on your skin as a compass to me."_

" _This is because you'll be in my vicinity. The ink will constantly glow as you face my direction. As long as you're..."_

" _...facing me from a distance, you'll know which direction to go. It will also glow brighter the closer you are to me."_

" _I had hoped we would be able to meet at Marwa with time to spare, but it looks like we might be cutting it close..."_

" _...and we might have to save each other. I can sense you coming closer. This comforts me. Sail safely."_

There was a brief silence between them after the final message. Nami tapped the pen on the counter as she slipped into pensiveness. "We were planning to get there with three days to spare on the curse..."

"Now it looks like we have to cross a desert," Chopper said with a sigh. He hated deserts... "I wonder how long it'll take to get to this temple."

"Hopefully not long," Nami mumbled. "We can't afford that."

"But at least there's no way we can possibly get lost," Usopp optimistically reminded. He pointed to Sanji. "We've got a living compass that'll lead us directly to the person we're looking for. That should save us some time, right?"

Nami nodded, deep in thought. "It's true, it should." Then she went on, "But I'm not comfortable with 'cutting it close' as the message said. We need to make more time somehow to try and get to Imad earlier than expected."

"Whoever this is says that they're running out of supplies, too. I guess we're gonna have to pack extra supplies for Inky?" Sanji suggested, subtly chagrined at his usage of Luffy's nickname but it was becoming convenient to say at this point.

"It wouldn't hurt," Chopper agreed. "And I'll prepare some medical kits, too."

"I'm gonna go see what I can do to get this ship at that island, fast," Nami announced. She turned to Usopp and handed him the piece of paper with the inscribed messages. "Usopp, you tell everyone else about this. Let Robin look this over, especially."

"Got it!" Usopp was out the door in seconds. Chopper followed him out.

Nami turned to Sanji and handed him her pen. "Don't worry about afternoon snacks, Sanji-kun. But if you're going to do something, plan out our supplies for this trip."

"Okay, Nami-san," Sanji said with a gentle smile. "I'll do that."

* * *

That evening, Sanji cooked a magnificent feast, and nobody could stop him. He knew that soon, his shipmates would be  _forcing_  him to stop and wanted to at least make his last meal a good one. Even if he felt completely drained by the end of it. And if he thought he knew what drained felt like before, he'd certainly correct himself now.

At dinner, the Straw Hats discussed their plans. Nami informed the crew that if they could catch a certain air current, they might be able to spare half a day. Robin enlightened everyone on her theories about the user which she'd explained to Sanji that morning. Luffy, Usopp and Chopper listened to everything while shovelling food into their mouths and Zoro was mostly silent, as usual. The swordsman sent some awful glares Sanji's way the entire meal, too. Sanji simply didn't know what the muscle-head's problem was.

It was, however, when Sanji's mark had glowed with poor timing that the mood became starkly serious. The sudden drop in his energy levels forced him to crumble under the weight of a large fruit platter with a devastating clang. The cook was on his knees, panting in sheer exhaustion. He wanted to kick an abysmal hole into the ship at the sight of his fruit scattering and rolling across the floor. Sanji clenched his teeth. "Dammit..."

"Sanji!"

"Sanji...!"

"Are you okay!?"

The cook felt the last of his pride being torn from him when Robin's hands bloomed from the back of someone's seat to help him up. He accepted her kind gesture, of course. It would be rude not to. Everyone's eyes were now on him. Then there was the loud screech of a chair as Zoro stood, nonchalantly walked over and then bent down to begin collecting the fruit.

Seeing this, of all things, coupled with his pent up stress and emotions had Sanji practically flying out the door. They called after him, but he slammed the door, cutting off their voices. He braced himself over the railing, teeth clenched with hands frantically running through his hair. "Fuck...!" Feeling unable to control himself much longer, he moved around to the rear of the ship. Folding his forearms atop the railing there, he pressed his forehead to them and tightened his jaw. "Shit!" he yelled, his voice heightening in pitch.

It took him several minutes to straighten back up again. He was quick to pull out a cigarette with a slightly shaky grip. He had to flick the lighter four goddamn times to get a flame. The only soothing thing to him right now—besides the nicotine—was this breeze blowing through his hair, the sound and smell of the ocean and the remnants of a beautiful sunset that he hadn't even witnessed today.

Would he be around longer than six days to keep experiencing these things?

Sanji looked down at his arm and scrunched up his sleeve. He brushed his hand over the mark, encircled it with his fingers, and pinched the skin there. He wanted this greedy fucking thing off of his skin. Wanted it to stop taking and taking and _taking_ from him each and every goddamn day.

It took everything. Even his pride as a cook. Because Sanji knew, come tomorrow, he wouldn't be able to do it anymore. If he couldn't even hold onto a goddamn  _platter_ , he would be too weak by tomorrow.

Clunky footsteps approached him.

"What do you want?" he asked harshly.

"Nami and them are cleaning up in there," Zoro informed. "Luffy's gonna talk to you."

Sanji scoffed and stared out into the darkness of the ocean. "So why are you here and not him?"

"Because I want to be. Is that a problem?" Zoro stated bluntly.

This had Sanji twisting his head to the side a little. "Heh." He exhaled smoke and watched it waft out into the expanse of the ocean. "Because you want to..." he echoed dully.

Zoro's hand was on Sanji's shoulder in seconds, and he twisted the cook to face him. Sanji expressed a layer of shock atop his exhaustion. "Listen," Zoro stated powerfully. His eyes were sharp and intense and seemed to glow in the light of dusk. "If you start slipping now, you're a guaranteed dead man. You hear me?"

Sanji laughed at him. "Don't be so dramatic, Marimo." Then he shoved Zoro's hand off of him with a surprising amount of buried strength. "Doesn't suit you."

"Tch." Zoro scoffed, and then wasted no time getting out of the cook's depressing presence. He passed Luffy on the way there, shot his captain a hurried glance, and was gone.

Luffy treaded slowly to the cook, who went back to leaning over the rail, facing the ocean. "Sanji..."

He responded quietly, "Hey, Luffy."

"I don't want you to stop cooking," Luffy said. "Your food is the best. But until you feel better, Sanji..." The captain stepped up directly behind the cook, bowing his head as he took off his hat. "Until we find Inky and get rid of that curse, I'm relieving you of cook duty." He pressed it atop Sanji's head for reassurance.

Sanji lowered his head, placing his palm on the bulge of Luffy's straw hat. Wetness streaked down his cheek as he gently closed his eyes, accepting.

"Understood, Captain."

_**...TBC** _


	2. Part 2

**·⁞· Day Six ·⁞·**

The fifth day had gone by—for the most part—uneventful. Sanji was forced into relaxation mode to preserve his energy, and while it deeply upset him to have Nami and Robin cooking, he was there to supervise them. Also, it gave him a lot of time with the girls alone and he received an abundance of attention from them due to his weariness, so how could he complain? Well, other than the weariness of course.

Merry managed to catch the air current Nami had mentioned, but three hours later they'd also caught a storm and the current was gone by the time it cleared. This was the fickleness of the Grand Line. Now they were sailing with normal winds for Imad.

Today, Nami predicted they would arrive by tomorrow evening.

The cook was sleeping in extraordinarily late—it was approaching noon. The crew was sure that if he woke up, he'd have a fit, but he wasn't waking up too easily and they all decided to let him sleep in peace. It was better to have him resting than up and about, trying to make himself useful on the ship. They all knew it was hard for Sanji of all people to kick his feet up, but there was currently nothing else they'd rather have him doing.

Sanji's condition was, of course, worsening. He suffered headaches, muscle weakness and pains, dizzy spells, tremors, cold spells, on and off fevers and near-faints. Since he wasn't sure how exactly the curse was drawing out Sanji's life, Chopper worried about what would happen to his internal organs if his body kept shutting down like this. It was a painful thing to watch unfold, for everyone.

The cook was pallid. There was an unhealthy darkness under his eyes. It was plainly heart wrenching to look at him, especially when he tried to act in good spirits. But ever since Luffy had given it to him, Sanji wore that straw hat as if to demonstrate that he was still fighting. They all knew this. This was their ass-kicking chef after all.

His mark was looking more and more like a tattoo encircling his arm. It was a medium-grey now, proving that it was well on its way to becoming solidly black.

There were four days left.

Currently, Zoro was below deck in the sleeping area, leaning over the cook who was sleeping on the couch. Chopper had ordered him to go check on the blond. He didn't have much of a problem with it until the reindeer demanded that he also feel Sanji's forehead for a fever. That's when Zoro had groused.

Sanji had his hands and arms curled into his chest with his back facing Zoro. The swordsman watched him breathe, his brows tightening together when he noticed his breaths were a bit shallow. The cook's face was tranquil, though. It was strange how deceivingly harmless he looked when he slept. Out of all the men onboard the Merry, Sanji was the one with the greatest temper and yet he was also the one with the calmest sleeping habits. Staring at the quiescent cook, Zoro cocked his head to the side slightly as he realized this contrast in character. It was oddly intriguing.

Finally, Zoro reached a tentative hand out and lightly touched Sanji's forehead with the back of his fingers. There was no fever from what he could tell, thankfully. The cook felt colder than anything. Zoro lifted Sanji's blanket higher, over his shoulders. As he did so, there was a golden glow underneath, swallowed by the cook's sleeve but still noticeable. Then, Sanji's peaceful expression twisted up and he exhaled faintly, clearly disturbed.

Zoro frowned. That was so unfair, wasn't it? This whole curse-thing was already ridiculously unfair to the cook. This was no way for a man to be. Not someone like Sanji, with all of his of pride and strength. But for that damn ink to be stealing the cook's life  _in his sleep_...it didn't settle well with the swordsman. Like Sanji was being caught off-guard. It felt petty to him.

Suddenly Sanji shifted, and Zoro stepped backwards. The cook was now on his back, opening his eyes to stare at the ceiling. The swordsman tried to duck out of there casually, but Sanji caught him.

"Marimo," he called, his voice scratchy.

Zoro stepped forward again. "What is it, Cook?"

Sanji sat up, rubbing his head and then slid his legs over the cushions and onto the floor. He gave Zoro a sour look as he glanced to the mast-ladder leading up to the hatch. No, he wouldn't ask. His pride couldn't allow that, not with Zoro. "I'm getting up," Sanji announced, standing up slowly. "What time is it?"

"Noon," Zoro answered, crossing his arms.

Sanji stared at Zoro incredulously. "Noon...?" he repeated, disbelieving. "Shit."

"I'll let everyone know you're awake," Zoro said, sounding almost bored as he grasped one of the braces on the mast-ladder.

"Wait," Sanji called out. Zoro stared at him expectantly. Sanji sighed, rubbing his head as he looked up towards the hatch and pointed. "When you get to the top, I might need a hand up."

Zoro simply nodded to him and climbed up. He opened the hatch and waited to clear Sanji. The cook was slow and careful, he didn't have much strength at this point and falling was the last thing he wanted to do.

"Ain't got all day, Cook," Zoro teased from above.

"Shut the fuck up!" Sanji spat. "I'd like to see you try this with some shitty life-sucking ink tattooed on your arm!" Then the cook grumbled, "I'm  _so_  kicking your ass when I'm back to normal."

Zoro laughed and commented dryly, "That's the spirit."

Sanji wished he could give the marimo a solid kick to the jaw right about now. But instead, as he reached the hole to the floor hatch, he sought out for Zoro's hand. It was when Zoro's strong grip curled around his forearm and wrist that he realized even the marimo was here to help him. It wasn't something Sanji felt he could ever grow properly used to—accepting help from Zoro—but he could appreciate it. He was hoisted onto the main deck and then helped to his feet.

As Zoro closed the door to the floor hatch, Luffy and Usopp came to greet Sanji and tell them about their fishing escapades that morning. Sanji was forced to—not so regrettably—brush the two of them off, needing a bathroom visit and a bite to eat after his impressively long slumber.

He would hear all about it later, he was sure.

* * *

It was late that evening—closer to night, really—when Sanji's ink began morphing again. Another message from 'Inky', and the first in just about two days. Zoro and Usopp were the boys' room with Sanji when it occurred. It read:

" _Hello again. You're getting closer. Unfortunately my situation has not changed, but the storms seem to be calming."_

" _However, if these storms go on much longer, I won't have enough water to make the 4 day journey back to Marwa."_

" _It really does appear that our situations are equally dire. I will repeat, the temple you'll be heading towards is Ruh."_

" _Also, if you don't get to Imad by tomorrow morning, you will have to make a 4 day trip in 3 days. This is possible..."_

" _...but very difficult. I hope you have companions to help you. If not, you can find help in Marwa."_

" _You won't be able to cross alone in your state. Remember to bring as much supplies as you can."_

" _I know this situation is very complicated and messy, but I trust that we'll both come out of it alive."_

"It looks like we're definitely crossing a desert," Zoro said as Sanji's ink changed back to normal. "What a pain."

"Seems like this guy's in a lot of trouble," Usopp commented with a half-smirk. "What kind of help is this?"

"Why'd he go wandering off to a temple in the middle of the desert anyway, at a time like this?" Zoro asked. "Sounds suspicious if you ask me."

"We've got no choice but to follow these instructions," Sanji admitted. He rubbed his face tiredly and closed his eyes. "Nami-san said we're getting to Imad by tomorrow evening. So we have to make a four day trip in three days..."

Usopp nodded, and reminded, "But it should be all right. There's seven of us, well, six, not including whoever will stay back with the ship. Plus, your mark will cut out any wasted time getting lost."

Sanji nodded and—far too worn to keep up conversation—he settled back on the couch, sprawling out. Feeling a cold spell coming on, he pulled a blanket over himself.

Usopp observed him, unsure of what to do when the cook rolled over with an expression which seemed to communicate that he was in pain. "Sanji...should I get Chopper?"

Sanji nodded softly. "Thanks, Usopp..." He was already drifting off.

Usopp scurried up to the hatch and Zoro was left by himself with an exhausted cook. Luffy was on watch tonight—something that the captain himself had insisted upon doing that night—and Nami and Robin were in their bedroom, of course. Chopper was upstairs mixing medicines.

Zoro noticed that Sanji was showing a different side of himself, now. He was more reserved, softer, and he let the crew help him without protest. It was strange to see this side of the cook. It wasn't like Sanji was giving up—no, he was simply trusting his crew. He wasn't fragile or delicate in spirit for this. But Zoro had to wonder what it felt like to get the life slowly sucked out of your body. Something like that had to change a man, if only temporarily.

But there was another part of Zoro that was apprehensive about this change in Sanji. Was it that the cook trusted his nakama like he should? Or was it instead that he was slipping into a dark mindset, one that was shrouded by this external façade? A façade which hid feelings of acceptance towards his inevitable death? Was that how he was seeing this?

Was he afraid?

"The Grand Line...really is a shitty bastard of an ocean, isn't it?" Sanji mumbled, his back to Zoro. He didn't know what possessed him to say it. He just felt...spited, by this ocean. This sea current that they sailed on, and waters which were no doubt connected to his ocean had instead, along the way, brought him a curse. A curse which had an enormously high chance of ending him before finding his ocean could ever become a reality.

These waters were bringing his death, not his dream.

"It is," Zoro agreed, staring at the carpet below him as he sat cross-legged on it. "But that's why we're here. If we don't struggle, our dreams will mean nothing."

Sanji's brows creased at Zoro's words. "What do dreams mean when you're dead?"

"I can't know that," Zoro stated calmly. And suddenly, he had his answer. The cook was scared. The cook was  _frightened._

"But what I do know is that dreams can still mean a lot to the people you leave behind. Those people carry your dreams forward," the swordsman expressed, closing his eyes meditatively. A white sword was being handed to him in his memories. "That's something we do on this ship."

Everything Zoro said, he always said with absolute confidence and heart. Every action Zoro made, he always acted out with sheer willpower and resolve. The first words Zoro had spoken to Sanji had been like this. The first time Sanji witnessed Zoro shed his blood had also been like this. It was something Sanji had always admired in him from the very beginning. His piercing honesty.

He needed this from Zoro, now. "Is it enough?"

"That's something you decide, Cook," the swordsman replied. Zoro didn't appreciate the fact that Sanji sounded so resigned...like he was ready. This wasn't a change he wanted to see in their cook. Zoro opened his eyes, and turned his gaze to Sanji's back on the couch. "When we find this guy, when we get that mark off your skin and you come back to this ship alive, these feelings you have now will be gone. You'll be alive and kicking and the only thing you'll wanna do from there is sail and look for that ocean."

Rattled by those words, Sanji's eyes opened wide. He was perplexed for a moment, and when he heard the swordsman stand behind him, he shifted backwards—ignoring the weakness of his arms—to stare at Zoro's back. His heart raced at the sight of such fortitude in a figure. These were the same broad shoulders, the same spine, the very same flesh and blood of a man he'd seen nearly cleaved in two for the sake of his dream. This was a man who'd instilled in him the courage to chase after his own dream.

Yet how was it that this time around, Sanji felt affected twice as much? How was it that it felt as though he'd been plunged into something so much more than admiration?

Sanji watched the swordsman turn and begin his climb up the mast-ladder. He was trembling in his shock, baffled by his own emotions. Then, he shifted around again, facing the back of the couch, eyes still open. What was this...?

He was tired. He couldn't waste his energy thinking about something that'd bloomed from an exhausted mind. These were emotions that he couldn't trust.

Chopper and Usopp came back down soon after, and the reindeer spent a good hour or two staving off Sanji's fever which had been lurking all evening. The cook slept solidly throughout it all.

**·⁞· Day Seven ·⁞·**

"Everyone!" Chopper's voice rang out in the middle of the deck. "Nami says we'll be reaching the island by sundown, so I just want to make some things clear before we arrive."

The crew—sprawled out in various locations on the main deck—turned to their doctor with open ears.

"Going through the desert will put a strain on Sanji's condition," Chopper informed. "I don't know how this curse works in detail, but it'll be dangerous for him to be in such a harsh environment. What I'm saying is, it's possible he could die before his time limit is up. We have to make sure that doesn't happen...I should have it covered, but just in case, I want to give everyone a quick lesson on things you might need to know."

Sanji sat on the deck with his back to the mast as he listened to the crew engaging in Chopper's little mini-lesson. He drifted in and out of what was being said, his eyes closed with a cigarette perched between his lips. He felt totally sapped of strength, his muscles hurt, his blood felt cold and he couldn't keep his limbs from shaking. Sanji was finding it harder and harder to focus...even his brain seemed to be in the starting phases of shutting down.

The only thing he still took pride in was the fact that he could stand and walk, if he needed to. Even if his balance failed him every so often.

Sanji opened his eyes a crack. The deck was darkening with the sky. The sun would be setting in...two hours maybe? Judging from the lighting, the position, the specific hue of the waves and sky...

His gaze settled on Zoro, who was holding a syringe under Chopper's watch as the doctor instructed him. Sanji quietly laughed to himself and tilted his head upwards along the mast, closing his eyes towards the sky. He let the sways of the Merry calm his anxious nerves. Soon, they would be reaching Imad.

Soon, his real challenge would begin.

"Hey Cook."

Sanji opened his eyes to Zoro's form kneeling down to him. "What?" he mumbled.

"Everything's set with our supplies, right?"

Sanji slowly nodded. "Yeah...it's all ready."

Zoro's eyes were honest even as he spoke with a hint of jest. "Are you?"

The cook chuckled tiredly, giving Zoro a half-lidded gaze. But along with the swordsman's query came a unique brand of excitement. "Damn Marimo..." He knew he looked like shit as he said it with that sad little grin of his, but...

"Can't wait."

Zoro smirked. This was more like it.

* * *

The sky was a bruised shade of purple and blue by the time Imad came into view, the sun now retired behind them. The air felt noticeably warm even at this time of day—this was a summer island, after all. They docked at the port town of Marwa with intentions to make a quick trip into the city to gather their bearings—among other things with the help of their booty. The journey here had put a strain on all of them. They'd prepared for everything that they could.

For the moment, Usopp and Sanji stayed behind with the ship. The rest of them came back fifteen minutes later with robes, a map, and a camel for Sanji to ride on. They'd also asked a shopkeeper about Ruh Temple and how long it took to reach it, and indeed, to travel there at a sane pace, it was a four day trip. They would have to do it in three. The man who'd sold his camel told them to beware of burrow-snakes—a large, vicious and venomous desert snake which slithered under the sand to make sneak attacks.

Soon their robes were on, backpacks overtop of them, and they were ready. What they couldn't have predicted, however, was the fleet of marines heading straight for their docked ship.

"Are you kidding me!?" Nami exclaimed, utterly exasperated. "We don't have time for a battle!"

Zoro's hand was on the hilt of Yubashiri as he looked at the fleet. There were three ships, and he could only hope that there weren't more on the way. "Shit, did they follow us or is this just our rotten luck?"

"If we leave the ship here, surely they'll take it away or demolish it," Robin said.

Usopp looked to their captain, who was standing firm, watching the massive ships ominously approach. "What do we do, Luffy? We can't leave Merry here!"

Luffy clenched his fists, turning around to scan his crew. Sanji was already on the camel, slouched over in white robes, looking at him with an utterly worn expression. Luffy's hat was hanging on the cook's back, the string visible over his throat. He walked over and stretched his arm up to properly place the straw hat on the blond's head.

"Luffy..." Sanji said, staring into confident eyes. The boy's hand found his and clasped around it, squeezing.

"Sanji." Luffy smiled. "Come back alive so you can make delicious food after this is all over, 'kay? That's an order."

Sanji exhaled with a smirk, weakly squeezing Luffy's hand back. He promised almost inaudibly, "Sure thing."

Seemingly satisfied with Sanji's answer, Luffy turned back to his crew. He looked them over briefly before his eyes froze on Zoro. "Zoro," he called.

The swordsman stared at Luffy expectantly, waiting to take an order. There were memorable moments like these when Luffy truly acted like a captain. Whenever anything threatened the lives of his nakama, he never hesitated to lead them like no one else could.

"Go with Sanji."

Zoro nodded silently, and an unspoken sense of trust seemed to exude from the both of them.

As the inevitable marine sirens went off, Luffy nodded back, happy with his decision. He knew he needed to be here with his ship to help ward off the attack. He would need the rest of them to help protect the Merry and win this fight. But he knew, above all, that he could trust Zoro to keep himself and Sanji alive.

He could definitely trust his swordsman with this burdensome task.

They all said brief, hurried goodbyes as they handed over supplies, mostly water. Chopper gave Zoro medicines and bandages. Then Luffy, Nami, Usopp, Chopper and Robin ran towards the Merry to prepare themselves. Zoro led Sanji's camel back into Marwa, heading for the desert's entrance.

Sanji looked over his shoulder until the Merry and the crew were out of sight. The sirens rang on in the distance. "Do you think they'll be all right?"

"Yeah," Zoro answered. "Luffy's there. He won't let anything go wrong."

The cook nodded. Zoro was right. Such undying faith they all had in their captain. "Can't believe I'm stuck with a shitty Marimo like you..."

Zoro smirked with a short laugh as they came to a stop by an arching entrance made of deteriorating sand bricks. Tattered carpets hung above the arch, slightly animated by short gusts of wind. All over the town, citizens were busying themselves with repairs. It looked like Marwa really  _had_  been battered by days of sandstorms, which increased Zoro's trust in this Devil Fruit user. If just a little.

Beyond the arch there was nothing but sand and desolation. It was hard to see much in the small amount of light that was left, and so what lay ahead looked like a giant ocean of grey.

Zoro led the camel by its reins and they walked off of tile and onto sand. Zoro pulled up the hood of his sandy beige robes and covered his mouth and nose. He could feel the remaining heat of the sand rising up through the gaps of his robes, but the air was becoming chilly. Remembering their time in Alabasta, Zoro knew their greatest obstacle at night would be the cold. He looked back at the cook, making sure the blanket they'd brought was still attached to the saddle.

Sanji was holding his arm out in front of him, and his ink eventually glowed as promised. He let out a weary sigh of relief. This was a good start, especially since the glow didn't fade away and take his strength instead. This time it lit up and remained. The ink bracelet of light would serve as his compass to life. He looked down at Zoro and pointed diagonally to the left.

"That way, Marimo."

Zoro followed Sanji's arm off into the horizon of the desert. He placed one hand on his swords, tugged at the reins once more and set off. With a nasally huff, the camel followed.

It was going to be a rough journey.

**·⁞· Day Eight ·⁞·**

They travelled through the night. There was no time for sleep, and it kept Zoro relatively warm to uphold a hurried pace. What concerned him was that the cook refused to sleep, worried about Zoro getting them lost or some ridiculous nonsense like that.

The skies were clear, the moon was bright and nearly full. It gave them a good amount of light and caused the sands to deceivingly look like waves with the bluish hue they garnered.

They said next to nothing. Sanji didn't have the energy to spend and Zoro had to save his. There wasn't much for them to say to each other anyway. Comments from the both of them tended to lead to arguments, and this was an unnecessary stressor for them.

Sanji's mark glowed on, assuring them that they weren't wandering aimlessly. It stole life from him a couple times throughout the night. As a result, he'd nearly fallen into a slumber against the camel's hump, but willpower kept him awake. Whenever he'd turn around in the opposite direction, the golden light faded back to ink. And under the moonlight, he could see its darker presence on his skin. It looked much more permanent, now.

Inky had contacted him in a couple of brief messages, pleased that they were getting closer. The good news was that Sanji and Zoro could expect typical desert weather from there on out since the vicious system of sandstorms was apparently over and done with.

Most of Sanji's time was spent shivering in his blanket with cigarettes in his mouth. He stared at the stars, the moon, the wavy sand dunes—the great expanse of it all. Feeling so small and helpless with trembling bones brought him back to a different place; a different time. The life had been sucked out of him then, too. But here he was now, travelling on an ocean of sand to save his own life, not perched atop a rock feebly depending on waves to bring him salvation.

This time he was moving.

Sanji gazed down to Zoro, walking ahead of him and pulling the camel's reins. The man barely spared a glance back, but when he did, it was to give the cook a good stare down. Then he'd make a face and twist back around, continuing on rigidly and steadfast. Sanji found himself watching his back with stagnant, leaden eyes. He was dazed.

He  _had_  to be dazed, staring at Zoro like that.

But it was intriguing, Zoro's intensity. It'd always been intriguing. The man carried himself as far as his drive would take him, and he would drag others with him along the way. This was something that Sanji couldn't have guessed about Zoro upon first meeting him. That his drive; his intense motivation, determination and endurance weren't only for his dream. Zoro was the type of guy who could use his strength for others without hesitation.

Sanji had come to realize this about the swordsman. It was one of the traits they shared. It was a trust that they shared.

It was something that Sanji would flip around and do for Zoro in a heartbeat. He wouldn't forget the swordsman's blood, spraying into the air as he fell into the sea. If he ever saw Zoro falter a second time, a second day, Sanji knew what his own decision would be.

Because Zoro was nakama.

And so, swaying with the camel, Sanji stared at Zoro's back as the swordsman tenaciously persisted on. He gazed with a quickening heartbeat as the swordsman kept him following, kept him moving...

As it continued to glow, there was a consistent heat that Sanji felt from his ink. But the subtle sting that came in that moment had him preparing for another bout of exhaustion. Sanji breathed out heavily and sluggishly leaned against the camel's back for support.

Zoro looked back at him with a frown. "For the last time," he said. His voice was soft; it didn't need to be loud in the dead silence of the desert night. "Go to sleep, shitty Cook."

"Can't..." Sanji mumbled with his eyes closed. His head listlessly bobbed from side to side with the camel's movements. "...you'll...get us lost." There was the tiniest hint of a smug grin on Sanji's lips.

"Asshole," Zoro shot, annoyed. "Will you sleep if I promise to check your arm every ten minutes?" He would check the blond's wrist for more than just that fancy golden glow at this point. Seeing the cook that pallid with his eyes closed would have Zoro mistaking him for dead at every glance behind him.

No amount of willpower could keep Sanji awake anymore, and Zoro's idea sounded like a good enough plan. He could only hope that the idiot would keep his word. But, Sanji would have to trust him to do it since he didn't even have the energy to respond as he slipped into a deep slumber.

Zoro smirked lightly as he peeked behind him. "Damn Cook," he scolded, clutching the hood tighter to his face. "Just leave it to me, okay...?"

* * *

Sanji had only explained to him how the mark worked about a  _million_  times, so Zoro was quite clear on his task while the cook slept through the night. If that damn ink on his arm kept glowing in the direction that the cook faced, they were on track. Simple as that.

So, the entire night, he did  _not_  let that mark die out. Not for a second. As soon as the sun came up over the skyline, the desert was practically set ablaze. He'd had to make a quick stop to unravel the cook from his blanket. Sanji hadn't awoken despite how much Zoro shifted the blond around to free him from it. This was concerning, but Zoro checked his mark, then his pulse and continued on forward.

He did, of course, manage to frequently shake the cook into a half-conscious state to force him to swallow some water.

Zoro took a swig from his canteen and rubbed his eyes. One night without sleep wouldn't beat him just yet. Zoro's body was fit for this. He trained daily for this kind of strength. He knew his body could go on. He saw it as a work-out; a challenge. The swordsman wiped the sweat from his jaw and brows and picked up the pace.

This was why Luffy had chosen him.

The problem was that the camel seemed to be struggling. But it would have to keep up, because they couldn't afford to rest any longer than it took to retrieve water and food. Those animals were made for this kind of work, weren't they? Endurance in the heat.

He heard a rustling from behind and glanced back to see the cook awake and unscrewing a canteen.

"Mornin' sunshine," he greeted with a crooked grin.

Sanji's unsteady fingers screwed the lid back on after taking the water in with two slow gulps. Looking up, Sanji squinted at the sun for a second, judging its position. He felt its rays beating down on his face and bent an arm back with strain to put Luffy's hat on for shade. Then he looked down at Zoro. "'s not morning," he pointed out quietly. He inwardly cursed at how weak his voice had come out. "How long...?"

"A while."

Sanji immediately looked at his left arm and held it out slightly. The mark glowed, strong as ever. "...not lost?"

"Of course not, stupid Cook!" Zoro spat back, his profile irritated. "We're on track." Then, Zoro halted. "You should eat something," he noted, rummaging through the pouch strapped over his shoulder.

"You've been eating...?" Sanji wondered. Was the marimo taking proper care of himself? Was he even sleeping?

"Yeah," Zoro answered. "But you haven't. I've only been able to get you to swallow water."

Sanji would've laughed if he had the strength. Wasn't this situation very...flipped? Zoro providing  _him_  with nutritional needs? "You've...been taking care of me, shitty swordsman?"

Zoro glanced up at him, looking stern with a hint of embarrassment when he saw the subtle smirk on the cook's lips. He walked over with an apple and a tart. Chopper had told him that sugary foods worked miracles in the desert because of their high energy content. "If I don't, you'll die, right?"

"Heh," Sanji grinned as he accepted the food. His fingers brushed over Zoro's amidst the brief exchange. "Didn't think you cared..." he murmured faintly.

Zoro frowned at the cook. It wasn't something Sanji would normally say aloud, but it did ring somewhere deep within the swordsman. He knew he was aloof, he knew that he didn't tend to express himself, but how could anyone on this crew—even Sanji—seriously think that he didn't care? Contrary to what Sanji might've thought, he  _wasn't_  emotionless.

"Your fingers are cold," Zoro observed, his voice monotonous.

"Zoro."

Zoro caught Sanji's upward gaze.

"Have you...slept?"

The swordsman turned back around, facing forward. He grabbed the camel's reins and walked on ahead. "Don't worry about it, Cook," he practically demanded. "Just eat."

Sanji's eyebrows knotted together as the camel ambled on. Then he looked at his food with an unpleasant expression. His body felt too weak to even have an appetite for this. But he above all knew how important it was to get something into his body.

Zoro walked on in silence for several minutes. In his time alone with his own mind, he'd thought of a possible solution if everything else went to shit. But the cook wouldn't like it at all. He didn't look back to Sanji as he began. "Hey, Cook..." He didn't need an answer to know Sanji was listening. "If this whole thing goes wrong...should I cut off your arm?"

"Sadist."

"What do you mean 'sadist'!? Wouldn't that stop the curse?"

"It's...a terrible idea," Sanji said bluntly.

"Why?" Zoro asked, somewhat sore. "I know your hands are important to you but in a situation like this you've just gotta bite the bullet—"

"That's not it, Marimo..." Sanji interrupted him. He sighed, shifting back again the camel as he steadily chewed on his apple. "I wouldn't be able to survive that kind of blood loss." He took a short moment to gather more air. "...too weak, wouldn't make a difference..."

Zoro growled. Damn, that was probably true. Sanji was already too drained to properly walk on his own, let alone survive a portion of his arm getting chopped off in the middle of the nowhere under the hot life-sapping sun. Zoro's jaw tightened. "Is this really all we can do?"

"Starting to...worry, Marimo?"

"I'm just trying to keep our options open."

Sanji hummed, amused. "You were the one who said...from the start...that we don't have any other options."

Zoro closed his eyes and mouthed a curse. "Yeah..." he said, opening his eyes again. "I know, Cook."

_I just hate being so powerless. If everything goes wrong, and I can't save you..._

It felt like his heart was being stabbed from the thought alone. And he remembered.

He was running, running, running...he stepped into a large room, panting and distraught. He saw her, cloaked by a white sheet of death. Her father stared back at him, eyes quiet and mournful and he knew then...Zoro knew, then...

He ran his forearm along his brow and resolutely kept one foot in front of the other.

**·⁞· Day Nine ·⁞·**

The next day was arduous.

Zoro trudged on stubbornly through the night as the cook's life further deteriorated. By daybreak, the camel was spent and would move no further. Zoro was definitely in need of a break, so they were forced to stop for an hour.

They were perched atop a modest sand dune as the moon shone down on them. On the skyline, there was the faintest hint of pink and purple, indicating that the sun was on its way. The swordsman sat down with one knee drawn and the other stretched out. He sat munching on some dried meat and refused to lie down because surely he would fall right asleep. Sanji ate and drank too, but the cook ate slowly. He'd been quieter today and slept most of their travelling time away. He wasn't able to help it. As the tenth day drew near, Zoro began to worry that the cook wouldn't wake up the next time he closed his eyes.

Sanji's entire body was shaky, heavy and weak. He found it strenuous to make any movements and his joints seemed to creak, like his bones were now brittle. It was hard to keep his eyes open, especially in the daytime with such a blinding sun pounding down on them. It even felt increasingly difficult to breathe. Zoro was giving him stimulants in the form of pills with his food, and while it helped to keep him more aware, generally after an hour or two he fell back into his regular state of absolute exhaustion. The fact that his mark continued to draw from him also offset the effect of the pills.

It was during their small break that Zoro felt a rumbling beneath him. Curious, he examined the sand closer, curving down to it. He studied it closely under the full moon and subtle light of daybreak. He witnessed the little grains of sand vibrating against each other and when they started to pop off the ground slightly, he looked around. The sand shook beneath his very feet. What was this?

Looking back to Sanji, the cook also seemed to notice it as the blond stared intently at the ground. The camel was getting anxious.

The shaking was violent, now. Could this be...?

Zoro's hands were on his swords. He sensed it...something big was coming. Something big and—

The sand in front of him suddenly erupted and Zoro was thrown onto his back. He slid down the dune, but managed to catch himself about halfway. He built up enough momentum to start running back up to the crest. Adrenaline surging through his veins now, his reactions were quick and his eyes were focussed. He saw a snake, an  _extraordinarily large grey snake_  and it hissed aggressively as it shot for the panicking camel.

Zoro dashed forward up the hill, drawing one sword. _Shit!_

The camel shrieked as the snake wrapped its body around it, squeezing Sanji's right leg in its grip and trapping him in the process. "Shit...!" the cook swore, trying to slip his leg out as the camel jumped back on its hind legs.

The snake's head was facing the camel's as its body coiled around, entrapping the poor creature. The great reptile cleaved its mouth open terrifyingly wide and then it hissed again, bolting forward to sink its teeth directly into the camel's head. Right after this lightning quick attack there was another, this time with blades as a weapon instead of teeth.

"Bastard!" Zoro yelled, and in one powerful, broad swipe the snake's head was cut clean off and the portion of its body restraining Sanji's leg grotesquely split apart. But the cook was already falling and Zoro wasn't able to catch him before he landed hard on the other side of the sand dune and began to roll.

Zoro dashed forward and leapt with an open, nimble stance, sliding down the dune on his feet and following Sanji's rolling figure until he caught up with it at the bottom. He leaned over the cook and grabbed his shoulders to inspect him.

"Hey!" he called out, panting and brushing the tangled blond strands out of Sanji's face to get a good look at him.

Sanji coughed and then opened his eyes blearily. With a fatigued exhale, he smirked and groaned: "...Ow."

"Heh!" Zoro chuckled, keeping a firm grip on Sanji's shoulders. "Shake it off, Cook."

"You're just—peh!" Sanji spat out sand with a hack. "You're the worst...bodyguard ever, shithead." Then, the cook's eyes widened with more vivacity they'd held in days. "The camel..."

Zoro's smile disappeared and he squinted towards the top of the sand dune. "C'mon," he beckoned, helping Sanji to his wobbly feet. "Let's see if it's still alive."

He slipped the cook's arm around his shoulder to support him as they slowly made their way back up the sand hill. Attached to Sanji like this, he could feel just how horribly his body trembled from the strain of walking upwards on a shifty surface.

Finally, they reached the top. The cook breathed heavily from his efforts and they both looked to the collapsed camel in the sand. It's face was puffy and swollen, it's fur clotted by blood. It wasn't breathing. The large snake, sliced in two portions, lay there unmoving with part of its tail arching over the camel's body. The severed head was at the bottom of the dune. Zoro and Sanji were silent as a gust went by, stoically howling past them.

The camel had taken a direct bite to the head from a large, venomous snake. It was clear now that it was dead. They would have to continue on foot.

"I'll get the supplies," Zoro stated with composure, helping Sanji down before getting to work.

Feeling dizzy and about to collapse, Sanji had to lie down with his back in the sand as he waited for Zoro and tried to steady his breathing. He lay motionless and stared at the stars above and at the dawn of the sun to his right. He gazed at those purplish-pink hues exploding over the silhouetted curves of the desert. It was beautiful. It was grand. It was all too familiar to him.

He was hurt, he was cold, he was weak, and he felt like the air was being compressed right out of his lungs. His muscles were spent. He couldn't move anymore. Sanji closed his eyes when he felt their sting. His life was truly beginning to slip away.

He was sitting high above sea level, waiting, his body nothing but skin and bones and his mind a hollow wash of agonizing hope. He'd come to know how the sun lit up the ocean at every curve of the skyline, and with each splash of a wave. How the sky and sea could inflict such torture with their beauty and boundlessness, enticing an escape beyond him. How he sat underneath it all a mere speck in their laughing gaze.

He could tell time by colours, could predict weather by hues. He knew the pain of watching the sun rise into the sky, longing for it to tug a ship along with it from beneath that untouchable horizon; of seeing it slip back down under, pleading for it to dig deep for his salvation amidst its journey around the world.

And whenever it departed he was left alone in the darkness, waiting.

There were many ships under that grand gaze, probably thousands to be towed by the limitless sun as it made its cyclic return. So why, then, did it take so excruciatingly long...?

_Bring a ship to me when you come back._

He felt Zoro's presence looming over him.

"Cook," Zoro said with a bulging backpack at his feet. "You okay?"

"Zoro..." Sanji murmured before opening his eyes a mere crack. His vision of Zoro's worried expression was bleary and he took a deep breath. "I can't walk."  _I can't move anymore._

_Stuck on that lifeless rock again._

The sun began its ascent from the horizon, breaching the surface of the earth with magnificent clarity.

_Bring me a ship..._

"I'll carry you."

He was being listlessly lifted onto the deck of a ship. Waves rocked the boat to and fro, crooning a sweet lullaby. And then, as the medics swarmed, they sailed away from that rock. They sailed on and on and on and it didn't matter where, so long as they were moving.

He was moving again.

He was still  _breathing._

Zoro marched on with the sun rising beside him, their supplies strapped onto his front and Sanji on his back. His arms hooked in the cook's legs at his sides, and Sanji's forehead was on his shoulder, blond hair spilling over it. Sanji's cursed arm was dangling over his left shoulder, the ink glowing strong and bright in the swordsman's peripheral.

He moved tenaciously on with the rising sun, enduring and unyielding.

* * *

The day had been tedious and taxing for Zoro. Sanji hadn't spoken much of anything, other than 'water' when he needed it. He rarely asked for food, but Zoro forced it on him as much as he could. Between Zoro's lack of sleep, his constant efforts on the move, the weight of both Sanji and their supplies and the harsh fluctuation between two temperature extremes, the swordsman's body was beginning to approach total exhaustion. But his spirit could persist and his body would simply be forced to endure.

The sun was finishing up its cycle, sinking down over the earth's surface. It was around then when Sanji's mark took another piece of his life away. The cook became even limper on Zoro's back. Minutes later, Sanji finally said something.

"Luffy...and the rest..." he croaked weakly into Zoro's ear.

Zoro didn't make a verbal response. And breathing heavily, he didn't slow.

"...don't want them to...stop sailing...not for a second if I go..." the blond took another deep breath, as much as he could muster, and continued. "Tell them for me...to have a good journey. That I...want them to...to be happy. They'll need...another cook. Tell them that...shitty swordsman."

Zoro frowned. What was with this plea? He didn't want to hear this out of the cook, not when they still had another day to get through this. "I don't make unnecessary promises," he coldly replied. "Stop being dramatic, Cook. Keep it together."

Sanji absorbed his words, leaning his cheek on Zoro's shoulder. This was what Zoro did best, sticking to his resolve. But right now Sanji simply needed him to listen and understand where he was coming from. He wanted him to promise. Sanji's right hand slid over Zoro's chest, weakly grabbing at the fabric there. He felt the swordsman's harsh, warm breaths sweeping over his cold skin; felt his lungs vibrating through his chest. He felt the intensity of his strength, of his life.

Zoro's chest seemed to throb as he registered Sanji's hand there and he assured him: "You're not going to die, Cook." He glanced at Sanji's mark to his left to confirm that they were still well on their way. That they were still pressing forward.

Having nothing to lose, Sanji forced himself to ask: "Would you...miss me, Marimo?"

The swordsman was momentarily stunned by the question. It wasn't because he didn't know the answer—this he  _knew_ —but rather, he simply wasn't sure  _how_  to answer. "What's there to miss, you kicking me awake in the middle of my naps? Bitching at me for breathing?" he said with strain, his voice loud and hoarse.

"...My food, then?"

Zoro kept his lips firmly shut.

"Shithead..." Sanji quipped with a weak laugh. "I guess..." He drifted off and didn't continue.  _Maybe you really do speak through your actions._

Sanji could only hope this to be the case. He was struck with a harrowing inner ache at the thought of Zoro not mourning for him. It settled in deep, right at his chest; right at his core.

"Stop wasting your energy," Zoro said at last. "Just stop worrying about it and sleep. We'll arrive tomorrow."

Sanji took in his words and looked to the horizon, witnessing the last glimpse of the sun as it bid farewell for the night. Would this be his last time witnessing its farewell? Was the sun saying goodbye to _him?_

The air was already cooling. He could feel it blowing through his robes, invading and shocking his skin. He didn't want to close his eyes. He didn't want to say goodbye. Not to the sun, not to this world or the sea...not to his friends, not to the shitty old geezer. Not to Zoro. Not to his dream. Not to his life.

He tried to remember Zoro's words from back on the ship. Tried to imagine arriving in front of the Merry, greeting his crew with a happy grin as they sailed on for more adventures. He would cook a feast, a gigantic feast with the bubbling energy of ten men. He would feel the excitement crawling deep under his skin from being alive, from being home on Merry's deck with a purpose. He would search again for his ocean. For All Blue.

Zoro felt Sanji's trembling. Heard the soft, quivering sounds that he made. Felt the moisture bleeding into the material of his shoulder. He bore it and hoisted the cook upwards, readjusting him on his back and tightening his support on his legs. Zoro took on the weight of it all and dug his feet through the sand, one after the other.

Sanji was going to live. There was no other option. Because he couldn't accept that kind of failure from himself. He refused to go through that kind of loss again, to carry a dream with him for the sake of another.

Her father was handing him a pure white sword. He accepted it, bearing the weight of her dream from that moment on. He carried it with him on his shoulders, hoisting her higher and higher as he writhed and climbed to the top.

Zoro didn't want to accept this, because he knew he would carry Sanji's dream with him in a heartbeat. He knew that if he accepted this now, Sanji was already dead.

**·⁞· Day Ten ·⁞·**

On his final day, Sanji had a dream.

The Straw Hat pirates, throughout a flurry of adventures and struggles, had finally sailed to an ocean. They were a crew of six familiar faces, and possibly more—there were unnamed figures in the background, figures of people he'd never had the chance to meet. They had their hands on their hearts; Luffy's straw hat pressed over his. Their gazes were downcast. They weren't staring in wonder over the brilliance of this ocean.

They were carrying on his dream. They were remembering him in his haven of All Blue.

And when Sanji awoke on the evening of the tenth day, that dream fresh in his mind, he finally told himself that it was enough. For his crew to remember him and his dream, as Zoro had assured him...it was  _enough_.

He wanted them to know. He wanted Zoro to know.

The swordsman's teeth and jaw were sore—he'd been clenching them for a good while now to keep his body moving. The cook was now completely motionless in his grip, which had Zoro downright frightened. It didn't seem like Sanji could even move anymore. The only thing that comforted him was the cook's slow, dragging breaths. They were shallow and weak, but they were there. They were the difference between life and death on his back.

With every toilsome step he took, Zoro felt his earrings jarring against Sanji's head on his shoulder. Sanji's mark was shining more brilliantly than he'd ever seen it before. This was supposed to indicate that they were close. Yet it was evening now and he saw nothing but desert, desert and more desert!

Where the  _hell_ was this person?

"Zoro..."

The swordsman barely heard Sanji say his name. He knew why he didn't respond. His heart shuddered at the thought.

"Zoro..."

Zoro panted and gave in, answering gruffly. "What?"

"All Blue..." Sanji croaked out.

"Stop it, Cook!" Zoro shouted. He would drill it into Sanji's head. "You're not going to die! Didn't I tell you that already!?"

Sanji spoke softly into Zoro's ear. "No, Zoro. Please. Listen." The swordsman's silence allowed him to continue. "What you said...to me...back on the ship. If you guys...find it...by some accident...if you find All Blue...please..."

Zoro's chest quivered. He couldn't endure this. Not  _this._  "You say another word and you're giving in!"

But Sanji had to get these words out. They were his legacy. "If you find it...please...remember me. I want...my memory...in that place."

_I want my dream to live on...!_

It was  _enough,_  to have All Blue live on with the others.

"Stupid Cook!" Zoro's voice trembled with more than just exhaustion. "You're the only one stupid enough to believe in a myth! You're the only one who can be there to find your damn ocean!" He was regretting his words from back on the ship. He was regretting them fiercely, because they were solid and true. They were full of a harsh reality that Zoro simply couldn't face right now.

_Don't you dare fucking die!_

"Forget what I said! Your dream can't live on without you here to live it! If you can't be around to find that goddamn sea, then it will mean  _nothing_  to the rest of us!"

If Sanji could've smirked in that moment, he would have.  _What a selfish lie, Zoro._  "Just turn back..." he whispered, his voice scratchy and dry and hushed. "Turn back...leave me...take supplies...go back."

"I'm not leaving you! If you die, your dream dies too, you got that!?" Zoro shouted. He was lying, lying to refuse reality. "We're going forward! We have to be close! Don't give up, okay, Cook!? You're not that weak, right!?"

There was silence.

"We're going forward!" Zoro repeated.

Sanji again thought back to Zoro's compelling words on the Merry. Those words which had stirred something within him; something that he hadn't been able to fully comprehend at the time. But being carried now on Zoro's strong and unremitting back, he understood. Sanji knew.

With the last of his strength, he brought a shuddering hand to the swordsman's earrings. They chimed delicately in a way that always reminded Sanji of him. He uttered: "I..."

_...can't believe I...for such an idiot..._

Sanji's arm was at last afflicted with that infernal, life-sucking sting, and he knew. This was his goodbye. The sun was just a mere speck of light over the horizon as he faded, his arm lifelessly falling over Zoro's shoulder.

Zoro, noticing this, called back. "Hey...Cook!"

There were no breaths. Sanji's chest rising and falling on his back had been his motivator for days. But there were no breaths! His voice shook. "Hey...talk to me, shitty Cook!" Nothing. No words. Not even his fucking  _breaths._  "Oi— _Sanji!"_

Zoro's chest quivered as he stopped in his spot, wasting no time to twist the cook off his back and hastily place him down. He threw off his supplies and dropped to the cushion of sand. The cook was white, his lips were dry and blue and his eyes were gently closed. He wasn't sleeping this time. He wasn't  _fucking sleeping_ this time! "Fuck...!" Zoro swore, voice raspy from his sheer distress.

And then there was Kuina under that white sheet of death, her face drained of all colour, her lips just as terrifyingly blue...

Zoro jumped into action. Placing one palm on Sanji's chest and his other overlapping it, he braced himself above the cook and sharply pressed down. "Don't. You. Dare. Die!" He spouted, baring his teeth. "Didn't you promise Luffy to return, you  _goddamn fucking Cook!?"_

His compressions proving useless, Zoro shifted closer to Sanji's face. He plugged the cook's nose, tilted his head upwards, and pulled his chin down to open his mouth and airway. "What about your dream, huh!?" he screamed into his face, dipping into the other's lips with a boisterous breath. He blew. He blew with any hope of bringing the air back to Sanji's lungs.

He alternated fiercely to chest compressions again. "Come  _on!"_  he huffed out. "Come on, Cook!" Zoro rushed back down for another round of mouth-to-mouth. He did cycles of both resuscitation attempts. Everything was useless. Nothing was working. Sanji wasn't breathing. His heart wasn't beating...!

But then Zoro remembered something. He dug into his pouch and took out a syringe. Chopper had instructed him about this—use it as a last resort, he'd said. He frantically opened up Sanji's robes, exposing his pale chest. Zoro took off the small cap on the tip and flicked the strand-like needle twice. He braced the syringe full of adrenaline over Sanji's heart—just where Chopper had shown him—and lifted it high before thrusting it inside with a disturbing pop. He pressed down on the plunger, easing the liquid into Sanji's body and then he removed it after a brief pause.

His ear to Sanji's chest, Zoro waited with trembling hands and bated breath.

But there was nothing.

He panicked. "No, no, no— _no!"_

Not after they'd come this  _fucking_ far!

Zoro's features twisted up into desperation and despair as he was suddenly overwrought with immense disbelief and sorrow. He leaned over the cook's body and held his face in his hands. As if to wake him, Zoro frantically clapped his palms against Sanji's cheeks. He could feel that his skin was far too frigid and losing more and more warmth with every passing second. He stilled his hands on his cheeks and pressed his face up against Sanji's, forehead to forehead, willing him to move; willing him to  _breathe_. When he squeezed his eyes shut, wetness stained his lashes.

"Dammit, Sanji..." he uttered through clenched teeth.

He tilted into the cook's lips again, this time not to donate his air but to instead give him something else, something unexplored and unknown from deep within. This time he wasn't frenzied with the contact, but soft and still.

Then he shuddered, realization hitting him that Sanji was gone. His lungs were violent for a moment; had him breathing erratically on the cook's lips. Zoro moved back, separating them. He sat quietly as he brushed the dirty blond locks from Sanji's face and sombrely stared at the cook. Sanji looked peaceful, as he always did when he slept. But the lifelessness that characterized him now was extraordinarily difficult to withstand. Zoro felt heavy and sick just looking at him, with his captain's straw hat drooping off the side of his head...

He shut his eyes. He'd failed Luffy.

Zoro pounded his fist into ground with a furious eruption of sand. " _Fuck!_ " he screamed into the empty desolation of this wretched desert.

He'd failed the crew.

—Another strike into the sand.

He'd failed himself.

—And another.

He'd failed Sanji.

Breathing heavily, Zoro stared up at the sky, helpless to do anything else. Darkness was bleeding into the sky's vast canvas and the sun was gone. There were hints of shimmering jewels in the sky; the stars would be out soon. Dusty winds were howling past him without a care in the world. He was a mere speck amidst it all.

_You're not supposed to die like this..._

Zoro looked under Sanji's sleeve at his mark. It was still glowing.

Scrounging up what was left of his rigour, Zoro stood. He swung the pack of supplies around to his back and picked up Sanji's body to hold at his front. With an exhausted yet stern expression, he pressed onwards. His face was encrusted with dirt and sand, and moisture crackled the filth apart as it rolled down his cheek. All he could think about was putting one foot in front of the other.

He  _couldn't_  stop now, even as Sanji dangled lifelessly in his arms. They had to be close. They  _had_  to be.

In his memories Zoro was clutching onto a white sword bestowed to him, gravely mourning for his friend.

_**...TBC** _


	3. Part 3 - Finale

As the desert sky blackened with the sun's retirement, the light emanating from Sanji's ink intensified. It  _shone._  It shone bright and powerful, swaying on Sanji's arm and it was the only thing that gave Zoro any kind of hope. And as its golden brilliance blazed on in the darkness of dusk, Zoro clutched onto Sanji's cold body with a strong and dogged grip. He kept moving. He would not give up. He would not fall.

He would  _not_  accept this lifeless body in his arms.

The ink radiated like a second sun, but there was no temple. Instead, to the farthest outstretch of Zoro's vision, someone was running. Someone was running to him.

Zoro stopped—his face serious and grave—and shifted to a side position, ready to put Sanji down and draw his swords if need be. The figure drew closer and the swordsman could hear what sounded like wood chiming and clacking together. His grip on Sanji tightened when the person's harsh breaths were audible just some metres away from him.

It was a woman cloaked in a red robe. Vibrant patterns flowed out underneath from her skirt and her wooden jewellery rattled with her movements.

"His life force," she shouted with a gasp, voice cracking and sounding dry. "...is gone!"

"You..." Zoro murmured in surprise. He stepped back when the woman halted in front of him, panting desperately.

"His life..." she repeated, but drifted off to breathe. She then straightened and stared at Zoro with panicked eyes. "He just died, didn't he!?"

Zoro, amidst his shock and fatigue, couldn't seem to put it all together in his head. "Who are you...?" he asked defensively.

The woman slipped off her hood, revealing short, wavy dark hair which hugged her head and clung to her cheeks.

"I might be able to save him."

It was all she needed to say. Zoro didn't pause for a second—he didn't even give her a nod—he simply placed Sanji's cold body onto the sand and watched as she dropped to his side and grasped his left arm. With the golden radiance of the ink functioning as a light source, Zoro stared in awe as her hand turned to black liquid and she enclosed it over Sanji's mark. The glow was eclipsed for a moment, but then it all shone effulgently golden.

"He's been dead too long..." the woman mumbled sadly while easing her hand off of Sanji's arm.

Zoro was on his knees in seconds, eagerly leaning over Sanji as the glowing faded. He barely heard her comment and he didn't even think to respond. He just waited. Waited for that breath...

"I can only restore the ink and reset his curse..." she said solemnly, shaking her head. "I can't bring him back from the dead. I should have left sooner when I felt him fading—"

A violent gasp erupted out of Sanji, and it seemed to cleave the desert air in half with its intensity. The cook fiercely shuddered, his eyes wide open but bleary and unfocussed.

The woman stared at the struggling blond, her eyes equally wide in absolute shock. This was impossible. How...?

Zoro curved over Sanji as the blond reached out frantically with his hands. He desperately searched for something to cling onto, for someone to take him away from death. Zoro guided him upright and clasped onto Sanji, holding him tightly. He refused to let go as the cook writhed in his grip, struggling to breathe; desperate to reclaim the air missing from his lungs, the warmth lacking in his body and the life taken from his veins. Sanji's fingers nearly tore holes through the back of Zoro's robe from how strongly he clutched onto life.

Feeling Sanji breathing and shaking against him, intense and erratic, brought tears to Zoro's eyes. He lifted his hand to the back of Sanji's head and slipped fingers through blond strands. He pressed his head against Sanji's temple and looked down to the cook's shoulder. Zoro was overwhelmed with relief. He was so overwhelmed that he couldn't help the tears from falling as he clenched his eyes shut, relishing in the sound of Sanji's deep breaths. It didn't matter that the cook's body was frigid and shuddering, all that mattered was that he  _breathed._

Eventually Sanji's desperate coughs and gasps evened out into steady breaths. Then the hands clutching at Zoro's back fell down laxly, fingers dragging through the sand. Sanji was listless in his grip once again, but this time he was breathing.

Zoro set the blond back down softly in the sand. He was sitting at his side and his palm remained flat on Sanji's chest. He felt his breaths. He felt that heart aggressively beating. It was when Zoro brought his hand back to him that he realized he was trembling too. He looked down at Luffy's hat, settled on the sand beside Sanji's cheek, and gave a subtle grin.

Then, the woman across from him spoke up, and he'd honestly forgotten she was there.

"His chest..." she said softly, staring at the blond's bare, uncovered chest. She stared at the blood and aggravated skin over his heart and noticed a tiny hole there. "You gave him an injection?"

Zoro turned away from her as he wiped his eyes and nodded. "Yeah...when he..." he trailed off when the woman nodded.

"He was dead," she explained. "Long dead. The injection you gave to him was useless at the time because the curse was finished; the ink had absorbed all of his life. But I just restored the ink and scattered his life force back into his body, which, I think, gave your injection the chance to take effect as it should have from the start."

"You restored the ink...?" Zoro asked tiredly, feeling like he didn't understand a word.

"I'll explain it to you..." She looked down to Sanji. "To the both of you, later. For now, you should rest. You must be exhausted, bringing him here all by yourself." She turned and pointed behind her. "Ruh Temple is another three hours back that way. You were close." She said it with a subtle smile.

Zoro's eyes drooped as he tried to focus on her, massive fatigue taking over his body while he took off his pack and sprawled out onto his back in the sand. "We were close..." he mumbled, closing his eyes. It was a small victory.

"Oh, but before you sleep," the mysterious woman said with a raspy voice, forcing Zoro to open his eyes a crack. She coughed and asked, quiet and innocent, "Got any water?"

Zoro sat up lazily and then lifted the strap of the canteen off of him, handing it to her. He supposed that was the best thanks he could give her before plopping back down into the sand.

One hand was on his chest and the other outstretched, his fingers brushing against Sanji's arm. He remembered cold lips, as blue and lifeless as Kuina's. He remembered how frigid they'd felt on his mouth, and how something inside of him had felt awakened at their contact. He remembered that enigmatic feeling...

Zoro couldn't explain to himself why he'd given Sanji his lips like that—even when there was no amount of air that could revive him anymore—but what had been kindled from it couldn't be abandoned in his mind. What he'd come to understand, for just a moment, when he believed Sanji to be gone forever, simply could not be overlooked.

These memories of sorrow, desperation and attachment were too much for his weary mind to fully absorb and unscramble. And so finally, finally he could rest. Zoro was fast asleep in seconds.

* * *

The woman was awake when he opened his eyes, sitting calmly with crossed legs. She had a lantern lit beside her and a small notebook cracked open in her hand. She was scribbling inside of it, writing.

Zoro sat up, his head aching. He reached for the canteen resting beside him, unscrewed it and took a sip. The strange, dark-skinned woman made a quick, bemused glance at him and when he caught her stare, her green eyes didn't falter.

Then, she placed her pen in the spine of her notebook and closed it. She tilted her head at him. "You've only slept for two hours," she stated plainly.

"Yeah?" Zoro said, callously scratching his head. He looked down to the cook and shifted over to him. He noticed a blanket on Sanji, something that he wasn't responsible for. Must've been the woman. He gestured to the blanket and gave her his gratitude. "Thanks."

She nodded.

Placing a hand to Sanji's cheek, Zoro felt that the cook was cold, but not enough to raise alarm. Not as cold as he'd been while dead. His skin was gaining more colour, even as the darkness under his eyes remained. His breaths were smoother and less shallow. Zoro's palm was on Sanji's chest next, and he sighed lightly in relief when he felt his heartbeat.

The woman watched his actions closely. "You care for him?"

Zoro frowned, his cheeks warming up as he retreated away from Sanji and sat with one knee raised. "He's my shipmate."

"Are you two sailors?"

"Pirates."

"Ah," she hummed with an intrigued little smile. "Pirates," she echoed, as if she liked the way the word rolled off her tongue. "I've sailed with pirates."

"What's your impression?" Zoro asked dully, humouring her.

"Dirty scoundrels, most of them," she said bluntly with a shrug. "But some of them have been...interesting. You're a special breed of people, you pirates."

Zoro nodded, staring at the cook's breaths as he listened to her feminine but somewhat raspy voice.

She followed his gaze back to the blond pirate. "What's his name?" she asked.

"Sanji," Zoro answered. Staring at the cook now, that name felt very comfortable on his lips.

"And yours?"

"Zoro."

"Roronoa Zoro," she spoke from memory. "I thought it was you. The  _ex_ -pirate hunter?"

"Never really was one," the swordsman clarified. "But yeah. Definitely not my profession now."

"I see," she said with a short laugh. "We all have to find our place in this world, I guess. And that calls for...variation."

"What about you?" Zoro asked. "Your name?"

She gazed at him with striking green eyes. "Tala."

As Zoro absorbed this, there was a small groan to his left. His eyes shot to Sanji's face, which indicated to the swordsman that the blond was still sleeping. But then Sanji's hands twitched, his fingers seeking to sense as they dragged through the sand. His mouth parted as he took in deeper breaths, releasing another faint sound of discomfort.

Tala put her notebook down and crawled over to Sanji, leaning over him. Zoro stayed in the background as she asked softly, her voice crackling a little. "Can you hear me?"

Sanji's lips pursed shakily, like he wanted to speak, but instead he swallowed dryly. Tala looked to Zoro and pointed to his canteen. Zoro understood and grabbed it, handing it to her. Then she said, "You're lucky that I found you when I did. Any longer and I don't know if I would have been able to save you. You followed my directions well, you and your friend."

Sanji cracked his eyes open halfway, which prompted Zoro to tilt forward slightly.

"You're alive," Tala assured, leaning back down to the blond.

Then Sanji's eyes were on Zoro. It was unbelievable how amazing he felt just from witnessing that one, simple action from the cook. It was like their last obstacle had been overcome, just to watch him open his eyes and  _look_  at him. And he was struck by that feeling again, his mouth tingling with the sensation of frigid lips.

Sanji turned his watery gaze back to Tala. She unscrewed the canteen lid, her wooden bracelets and necklaces jangling together with the action. "You're alive, pirate," she echoed her reassurance, tilting the canteen into his lips to sooth his undoubtedly dry throat. Sanji swallowed the cool liquid slowly.

As if to reinforce Tala's words, Zoro finally shifted forward and leaned over Sanji directly. Sanji looked to Zoro again, his blue eyes filling with moisture.

"Zoro..." was the first word to escape past his lips. It was quiet, almost inaudible.

Zoro placed his hand on Sanji's shoulder. He spoke softly, "Hey, Cook."

Sanji's hand lifted slowly to curl around Zoro's wrist at his shoulder. "Made it, huh?" he said faintly with a weak smile.

"Yeah," Zoro responded with a soft chuckle. "Yeah, you made it, Cook."

Sanji stared at him a moment more before turning his gaze back to Tala. Then, he tried to sit up. "If I may..." he asked gruffly amidst his struggle. "...ask the name of such a beautiful lady?" He faltered when a sharp pain made his chest flare up in ache.

"Oh," Tala said, amused and flattered as she placed a hand to her chest. "He's a gentleman."

Zoro rolled his eyes, tilting Sanji back down at the shoulder. "No, he's an idiot. And he needs to rest."

"Ah, damn," Sanji whined, too weak to fight back against Zoro's hand pushing him down at his shoulder. "Always such a mood-killer, Marimo."

"I'm not," Zoro blandly denied. "You just  _died_  and then came back to life. I think it's fair to say the wooing can wait, Cook."

Tala laughed and leaned over Sanji. "My name – it's Tala."

"Tala," Sanji echoed in a love-struck tone. "Such a beautiful name..."

She laughed lightly, before informing them. "You two should sleep, we've got to make our trip back to Marwa starting tomorrow. I think we should get up in four hours. I can wake you."

"Aren't you going to sleep?" Zoro asked, eying her. She looked tired, but strangely not in the way he would've expected. It was the kind of fatigue that came with being weighed down by something.

"No," she responded, looking away. "I don't need to sleep very much."

Zoro stared at her, suspicious, before settling back down into the sand. He was sure an explanation would come to him soon regarding her mysteries and the curse. But for now, two hours of sleep wasn't enough to replenish him and he dozed, resting his weary mind and body.

* * *

It must have been the middle of the night when Tala shook the two of them awake. It was time to get moving. She led the way, carrying her bag over her shoulders and a map in her hands while Zoro and Sanji followed behind her. Fortunately, Sanji felt healthy enough to walk, but only with Zoro's support.

It was when Sanji's mark stung all too familiarly that he cursed. Zoro felt him falter and stopped to let him recover.

"What is it, Cook?" he asked.

"This shitty ink just..." Sanji said, shocked. "It just weakened me again."

Zoro's eyes widened and then shot to Tala, who stopped ahead of them and twisted around.

She ambled over to them, explaining, "You're still cursed. Technically you have ten days left, again. I didn't cure you, I simply reset the curse." She folded out her hand, indicating for Sanji to give her his cursed arm. He obliged with a blush. Her hand liquefied into ink and she smothered his mark with it. Her ink-hand shimmered and then faded, and she released his arm, her hand transforming back to flesh.

Sanji straightened up, feeling a refreshing burst of energy bustling under his skin. He looked to his mark, which still glowed brightly from being in Tala's presence.

"Anytime it steals your life, I can reset it over and over again," she informed. Then, Tala twisted back around, motioning for them to keep moving behind her as she continued to explain. "That ink on your arm is a part of me. Its purpose, when attached to another living creature, is to harvest life. When I reset it, what I'm doing is diluting it with my body's ink so that it becomes 'fresh' again, and your stolen life returns to your body."

"Thank you, Tala-chan," Sanji said, staring at her silhouetted walking figure under the moonlight as he pressed on with Zoro. "But...isn't there a more permanent solution?"

"This is a temporary solution until I finish writing," Tala revealed with a smirk, knowing that she was sending the two pirates in for a loop.

Zoro frowned at the little smirk she sent back to them. "What I want to know is, how come the curse was there for him to pick up to begin with? Why did you leave such a dangerous thing lying around?"

"Don't question Tala-chan, you brute!" Sanji bristled.

Before Zoro could point out Sanji's stupidity, Tala responded, "I suppose I should explain myself a little more, shouldn't I?"

The two of them were silent as a whistling breeze blew past them, pecking their skin with grains of sand.

"The Ink Ink Fruit gives me the power to be, essentially, an ink woman. But there's a dark side to this power, which is to curse. My ink, as I mentioned, has the power to harvest life, but this can only be done by writing a curse and attaching it to a living thing." Tala turned back to them briefly, eyes intense and sorrowful. "Rest assured, I don't practice this. Or at least, not with the intention of harming anyone."

They stared back at her, mystified by her words and feeling a hint of relief.

She turned around, maintaining her stride, and continued, "Perhaps the most dangerous element of this power is its permanence. The curse you were given was not written by me. It was written by a previous user, maybe from one generation ago or several, I can't really say. So, when the creator of your curse died, the curses he left behind didn't disappear with him. This goes for every previous user of the fruit. If they chose to write, their curses stay in this world. However, the ink goes dormant until a new user eats the fruit. So if I were to die now, that ink on your arm would stop taking your life, but once this power cycles around to the next person, it would suck out your life once again. This should answer your question, pirate-hunter." She let the epithet wily roll off her tongue. "I wasn't the one who left that curse. But I can't deny that I'm indirectly responsible."

Zoro hummed in response, mulling her words over as she went on.

"And I'm not absolutely sure, but I think curses go dormant because once the user dies, there's nowhere for the harvested life to go. You see, all of the curses scattered across the world as we speak, once they're attached to a host, all of that harvested life force goes to me. When people are cursed, their life gets absorbed into the ink and because it's an extension of my body, I receive that energy from afar. And so, blond-pirate, when the ink on your arm took some of your life just now, I felt replenished."

"I see..." Sanji said, looking worried. "You get all of that energy whenever anyone picks up a curse?"

"Yes," Tala confirmed. She glanced back to Zoro briefly as she said, "It's why I don't need very much sleep."

Zoro nodded, understanding. "And yet you seem tired."

Tala grinned as she sniffed, rubbing her cold nose. "It's not a very pleasant thing, receiving life from people who are dying. You have no idea how many of them I couldn't save and still can't save now. Their lives are in me...it's unfair, and I despise it. Not being able to sleep often isn't much of a luxury, either. But, I am a poet, so I guess no matter how you look at it, I wouldn't have been sleeping very much anyway." She laughed at that.

Sanji smiled at her, deeply intrigued as she gave them layers upon layers of information.

"My goal," she went on, "My dream is to destroy all of the curses left over in the world and to save as many people as I can in the process. Ever since I ate this fruit and discovered its true power, that's what my dream has been. It's my responsibility—I'm the only one that can sense where the curses are and contact those who've been cursed. In fact, I was on my way to Ruh Temple to destroy a curse there when I sensed you, blond-pirate. And you're very lucky that you managed to survive. Your curse is simple, but vicious, and it didn't give you much time."

Sanji's mouth tightened together at that, and Zoro seemed to squeeze around his waist a little more as they walked on.

"I've dealt with all kinds of curses. Whoever wrote them in the past..." she trailed off, images of ink, poems and flesh scurrying across in her memories. "Some of them have been cruel, strange, or sad. Some have been extremely detailed, and others more simple, such as yours. Some drain life slowly, others take it all away in one shot from a specific trigger. I've seen one that sucked away a woman's life piece by piece every time she took a breath, and another that would've killed a boy if he'd eaten a cherry before I got to him. I've even seen a curse that killed a man with the next kiss from his lover. They can be this specific, and this deadly. It's twisted, some of the curses that previous users have come up with and left behind. I'm determined to wipe all of that away from the world."

Sanji soaked it all in with a frown as he moved on to his pressing concern. "But how, exactly, do you take away a curse?"

"This is the difficult part," Tala admitted, pulling her rouge hood closer to her face as a dry, cold gust flew past them, peppering their skin with sand. "I told you before; the danger of this power is the ink's permanence. That curse on your arm is something I can't just...take away. When the ink attaches itself to a person, it's there to stay. Forever. Writing a curse is a permanent action. And even though I'm able to burn paper or destroy whatever medium the curse is on, I can't get rid of the curse on your arm unless we separate it by cutting it off, you see?"

Sanji's jaw tightened as his heart sank and he closed his eyes. He would have to brace himself for a harsh solution. It was bittersweet, far too bittersweet, but he would simply have to bear it.

"But there is something else I can do before it comes to that," Tala added. "Amputating your arm would be the worst case scenario."

Zoro's brows furrowed as he questioned, "What will you do?"

Suddenly, she twisted back to the pirates with a wide, cocky grin. "Write a poem, of course."

Zoro and Sanji both gaped at her. "Huh...?"

Tala laughed with mirth, spinning back around to begin trudging up a rather large sand dune. "I  _said_ , write a poem. Didn't I say I'm a poet?"

Sanji laughed a little nervously. "I don't doubt the brilliance of your poetry, Tala-chan, but...how...?"

She laughed. "Sorry, I'm just drawing out your reaction. It's fun," she prattled with a gleam in her eye, her mature personality suddenly becoming strikingly impish. "It's something I've been experimenting with, and it seems to work. All I have to do is add a stanza or two, or however many I'll need, onto your arm to play with the words of your curse and try to form some kind of solution with it. This won't stop it from existing as a curse, but I can at least make it a less severe curse, you see? And then you won't have to stick around me to reset it each time. Or at least that's what my goal would be—to mold it into a curse you can live with."

"So you can't get rid of his curse completely?" Zoro asked, clarifying. "That's what you're saying?"

"That's precisely what I'm saying," she confirmed. "But hopefully, by the time I figure it out, it'll be something you can live with, blond-pirate."

Sanji nodded, accepting her words. Even if he felt a little unsettled at the thought of having to live with a 'less severe' curse. What exactly was that supposed to mean? But whatever it was, it had to be better than death. "Thank you, Tala-chan. I'm sure you'll write something magnificent for me." The very thought of a woman writing a poem for him made his knees weaker than they already were.

"You're quite optimistic, aren't you?" Tala called down from the crest of the sand dune.

Before Sanji could respond with his blathering affection, Zoro cut in. "No, he's just a dork with women."

Sanji's arm on Zoro's shoulder hooked around the swordsman's neck, squeezing it unmercifully and demonstrating that his strength was returning to him. "What was that, shitty swordsman? You trying to make a fool out of me!?"

"You don't need my help with that," Zoro croaked out as he pried Sanji's arm away from his trachea. The strength of his grip gave him relief, though. The damn cook really was still alive.

After their brief scuffle was over with and they made it to the top of the dune with Tala, Sanji asked, "Tala-chan, why can't you just write off the curse?"

"I've tried it before on others, and it doesn't have any effect," Tala responded, her brows furrowing. "Writing the curse off was the first thing that I tried in the past but nothing happened, and the curse remained as it was from the start. My theory is that the ink needs to serve its purpose, which is to absorb life. I can't stop it from doing that. Another thing I can't do is contradict the original poem too much; I have to incorporate concepts from it and maintain somewhat of a flow. But I can try to play with the words and twist the meaning a little bit to, essentially, write you out of your curse's severity. The curse of my power is the fact that I can only bestow curses, and I can never fully take one away."

Sanji hummed, nodding.

"The problem with your curse is actually its simplicity. I'll have to find a way to work around it, but...I'm sure I'll come up with something that's better than dying in ten days. Something that'll keep you living even though your life is being drained..." Tala thought aloud, trailing off in contemplation.

The three of them continued on in silence, walking down the sand hill, a heavy mood suddenly pressing down on all of them.

Sanji had something else he was curious about. "The ink...as I came closer to the tenth day, the ink became darker. Why?"

"It starts to appear more and more as it feeds on your life. When it's invisible, it's empty ink. If I weren't here right now and your mark didn't glow, it would look invisible. It's how I knew, on your third day, that you could read it and I could begin making contact with you. I sensed its strength and thus, whether it was legible or not."

At the bottom of the hill, Tala turned around, reaching her hand out with the clack of wooden beads. "Water," she requested with a smile. "I've been talking too much."

Zoro handed it to her. "So then, you travel around by yourself hunting down these curses?" he asked.

"Yeah," she said while unscrewing the lid. She took one gulp and handed it back, green eyes settling on his, unwavering. "I hitch rides on cargo ships, marine ships, with sailors...and with pirates, too."

Sanji didn't really like the idea of a woman travelling alone in a world full of so many dangers, but he smirked despite it. "Have you ever considered becoming a pirate?"

"A pirate?" Tala seemed to laugh at that. "No, never. You pirates are free, but you've got some nasty enemies, and a bad reputation. I think the freest way to be is to just...wander." She shrugged.

But they understood. That feeling of wandering, sailing, of constantly  _moving_ , of not being tied to any specific place, of not being bound to anything. Of course, as pirates, they understood it. They lived it, even if she told them it was different.

It made Zoro's grip on Wado tighten at the thought of stepping foot on Merry's deck again. The ship that was sure to carry him and Kuina's dream forward until they sat at the absolute top.

It made Sanji eager to cook a massive feast as he'd promised to Luffy, to listen to Usopp's stories and watch as Chopper became naively immersed in them, to dote on the girls, to step on their deck each and every day as Merry brought him closer to his dream sea.

It made them all the more excited to get back to their crew who were sure to be waiting, with bruises, for them.

* * *

The three of them travelled for days. Their supplies were growing thin, but they at least had enough water to get them back safely. They rested four hours each day. With Tala there to keep resetting Sanji's ink, the cook was doing a lot better considering their environment and what he'd been through. At times, he was even able to walk by himself.

During the day when they rested, Tala wrote away, experimenting with the words of Sanji's curse and creating many poems to try and combat it. She never showed them a word, even when they asked, because she wasn't quite happy with it yet, both for artistic purposes and practical.

They had only half a day left to travel across the desert, according to the map. And so they took a break, resting at noon to try and preserve their energy.

Tala wiped her brow as the two men before her lay sprawled on the sand, sweating in their sleep. She had her notebook out, scribbling away on it and scratching her head from time to time. Then, her eyes widened, and she crossed something out before frantically writing something else in its place.

"I think I've got it," she murmured, reading it all over again to check its flow. Yes, that would work...there was a slant rhyme, but there was no harm in that. It would do. The structure was balanced; the rhythm was catchy and it flowed well. And most importantly, it served its purpose.

She woke them up to finally show them.

"Tell me what you think," she said jovially, practically bouncing around in the sand.

Sanji found her excitement cute, while Zoro couldn't help but feel like this woman had two separate personalities completely.

"So, your original curse is this: 'With each day forth thy life shall wane; on the tenth there shall be none left in thy veins.' I tried to copy the style of the original writer, with any further hopes of making this work. So, I could add:

'But I shall engrave a way to forestall thy grave; this life shall grow weary only on the tenth of ten days. Beyond the tenth this life will remain; vitality shall be bestowed nine days more to thy veins. This life shall every ten days have rebirth; death shall come as meant from birth.'"

"It's beautiful, Tala-chan!" was Sanji's obvious praise.

"I don't understand it," Zoro blatantly remarked.

"Fortunately, you don't have to," Tala said, somewhat sourly. "The curse acts out according to how the writer intended it. So even if the wording is a little ambiguous, if the writer wants to curse someone a particular way, the ink will obey. Judging from this, since I'm the new writer, it should work as  _I_  want it to. Which is that once every ten days, you'll be drained of energy, but you won't die. You'll just have to take it easy that day."

"Every ten days..." Sanji echoed. It was definitely better than dying, but no doubt, it would be a set-back to everyone. He would go through cycles of being useless to the crew every ten days. And what if they ran into trouble and he was too weak to do anything? What then?

"It'll be a pain," Zoro commented, rubbing his head.

"I know it'll be troublesome," Tala agreed. "But it's an alternative to certain death, and it's the best I can do without contradicting the original curse too much. Whoever wrote your curse meant for you to be sapped of life for ten days until your death, but I've...wait." The nomadic girl suddenly halted mid-sentence and flipped through her notebook as something came to her. She went back to her scribbled recording of Sanji's curse, reading it over again. "The person who wrote this clearly meant for you to die in ten days, but they wrote it as the  _tenth._  But that doesn't have to mean – or if I can twist it then maybe I can make it mean..."

Sanji and Zoro watched in silence as the girl mumbled incoherently to herself.

"I think I can try something different, a better solution, but I have to change up my poem. The rhymes will have to be different, and I hope I can do it without messing up the rhythm too terribly..." Tala murmured to herself, and then stared up at the two of them. "The 'tenth' is so arbitrary, you see? Even though it was meant to be the tenth in a cycle of ten days, it says the 'tenth'. I can try to make this mean the tenth of every month."

"It would definitely be better," Sanji agreed with a bright smile he reserved for women only. If this was the best she could do, he would just have to accept it. "Tala-chan, you're brilliant!"

"Don't praise me yet," she said, smirking. "I have to write it first."

"So, now the Cook will have a down day once every month, is that what you're saying?" Zoro asked.

"Yes," Tala nodded. "I think that's probably the best I can do. The ink, like I said, has to drain your life  _somehow_. It's there to do that, to curse you. But this doesn't mean that it can't give back the life it takes, going through cycles of giving and taking. I figure if I have the power to reset your curse and give you your life source back, I also have the power to transform a curse into something similar. And having it drain you on the tenth of every month wouldn't contradict the ink's purpose. But it  _would_  contradict the writer's meaning, so honestly...it's a bit of a gamble."

"I guess it'll have to do," Zoro said, staring at the sand as it intriguingly began to tremble. They would be forced to accept this solution because it was the best one they had. He supposed it was better than chopping the poor cook's arm off, even if that solution was, technically, still in the cards.

Suddenly, the swordsman recognized what he was staring at, the familiarity of that shuddering sand. He stood, hand ready at the hilt of his swords. "It's one of those damn snakes again. Maybe two."

"Oh, burrow-snakes?" Tala asked. "You're keen. I didn't even feel the rumbling..." She jumped to her feet, placed her notebook and pen inside of her pouch and then liquefied her arms into solid black ink.

Sanji stood on his own, his face serious as he detected the tremors. He reached into his robes, plucking out one of the cigarettes in his dwindling stock.

"Can you handle yourself, Cook?"

"Shut up," Sanji spat through his cigarette as he lit up. Sure, he had a massive headache, his muscles felt like they were on fire, his chest was sore and his balance was certainly iffy, but he was sure he wasn't much worse off than the marimo. Besides, he wanted to kick  _something_  in the jaw after being so useless for days.

"Just don't get bit," Zoro advised, teasing. "Don't wanna bring you back poisoned on top of cursed."

"And what the  _hell_  is that supposed to mean?"

"Hey, focus—" Tala tried to cut in as the rumbling began to feel like an earthquake.

"It  _means_  you're a real magnet for trouble lately, you know that?"

"Oh,  _I'm_  the magnet!?  _Me_? When  _you_  manage to become a lost child  _every_   _time we—_ "

There was an eruption of sand, and then another as two large snakes burst out of the ground and wasted no time lashing out at them. Zoro pushed Sanji out of the way and then split in the other direction as one of the snakes impaled itself into the sand where they had been arguing just seconds before. Zoro recovered quickly, drawing two swords with a malicious grin.

As the snake's body curled in from the impact of a failed attack, Sanji leapt, spun, then delivered a solid dropkick to its body, aided by gravity. The large snake scrunched further into the ground, its hisses muffled with its head buried in sand.

Zoro smirked at the cook's attack, even if Sanji landed shakily. The swordsman wasted no time and powerfully swiped his blades across, splintering the snake's body into two sections. It writhed as it split apart, parts of its torso falling to the sand with several thumps.

Tala was busy using her ink arms to brutally whip the second snake into submission. She was giving it deep lacerations all over its head and body as it hissed angrily and dove for her. She let it pass through her, her body exploding into black ink before rapidly reforming. If she could get a quick, clean swipe in, she might be able to slice it in half. But her whipping seemed to have angered it so much that its movements were unpredictable and frenzied. Twirling for momentum and power as she saw her chance, she threw her ink at it in a swiping motion, but the snake seemed to dodge and only received the clip of her attack. "Damn!" she yelled, frustrated.

"I'll finish it!" Zoro shouted, brandishing solid steel as he sprinted towards the furious snake. He leapt at it, swiping twice before landing. When his feet made contact with sand again, the snake squealed as its body ruptured into pieces and then it fell. Its body parts squirmed uselessly on their own until they stopped, indicating that it was dead.

Tala wiped her brow. "Thanks."

Zoro merely hummed and nodded, sheathing his swords with a powerful clank.

"Tala-chan, thank goodness you're all right!" Sanji yelled from his spot over by the dismantled body of the other snake. He pointed aggressively to Zoro. "I was going to leap to your rescue when this brute got in my way!"

Tala smiled with incredulous eyes as Zoro rolled his, cracking his neck as he walked back over to the cook.

Sanji was now staring at the carcass of the dead snake. He inhaled slowly, studying it closely before breathing out streams of smoke through his nose. "We're running out of food, but we should be back in Marwa soon, right?"

"We should, yeah," Tala responded. "In less than ten hours, maybe."

"Good," Sanji said, pensive. "I was just unsure if we should take some of this snake meat. But it's so venomous, I don't know if we're desperate enough to chance it."

"We should be okay. We don't have much food left, but since we're so close, all that matters is that we have enough water, and you guys did well to bring a lot."

Zoro slung his pack over his shoulder, noticing how much lighter it was since they were running low on supplies. He supposed this was the only good thing about using up their rations. "Let's go," he instructed.

"You sure you don't want to rest more?" Tala asked, surprised.

"That fight woke me up," Zoro responded. Then he looked to Sanji. "We need to get back to the crew as soon as possible."

Sanji nodded with a rosy colour to his cheeks, and it wasn't from the sun. "I hope Robin-chan and Nami-san are all right..."

Zoro ignored him with a growl and walked off on his own.

"You're going the way we came," Tala called after him. Zoro stopped in his tracks.

Sanji leaned into her and said, "Isn't he amazing? That lout can get lost in ways you'd think impossible. It's quite a sight."

"Shut up you idiot Cook!" Zoro shouted, blushing and stomping back to them as they continued walking in the completely opposite but correct direction. Then he quipped, "You're acting pretty damn cocky for a guy I had to carry on my back for two days straight."

Sanji growled at him even as he looked away with a quickening heartbeat. "Spare me the reminder, shitty algae."

"Tch," Zoro snorted, casually swinging a sheathed Wado onto his shoulder. "Such an ingrate."

As Zoro walked ahead of him, Sanji couldn't help the quick glances he made to his back, shoulders and neck. He watched the way his earrings dangled; remembered the sound of their chiming, entangled in his fingers before everything had faded to black. He still felt the weight of his realization and he frowned, turning his eyes down to the sand with a soft curse.

* * *

Their last stretch across the desert was exhausting, but they bore it. When the sand walls of Marwa came into view, relief washed over them all. They'd run out of water hours ago and only had a few drops at the bottom of their canteen. Sanji was again leaning on Zoro for support as they approached civilization at last.

When they entered the city, there was a faucet waiting for them. They filled up their canteens generously and gulped down as much water as their stomachs would allow. Then they filled them to the brim again and began their trek down to the docks.

After days of separation, they finally arrived to the spot that Merry was previously docked at. Except the ship was nowhere to be found. Instead, a cargo ship was in its place.

"Shit," Zoro swore, looking around. "This is where we were supposed to meet, right?"

Sanji sighed tiredly as he settled down on a boulder. He would've lit a cigarette if he hadn't run out hours ago. "Remember you're not on your own, Marimo. We're definitely not lost."

Zoro glared at him before walking off, closer to the water. "There's no way they lost to those guys," he said sternly.

Sanji's brows furrowed as he tapped his forefinger on his lips, a habitual replacement for his nonexistent cigarettes. He certainly craved one right about now.

"Your crew," Tala began. "You said that you'd left them to the marines, right?"

"We didn't  _leave_  them," Zoro spat back harshly. Then, he calmed. "They were going to handle it, one hundred percent."

Sanji collectedly put in, "How can we say that there weren't reinforcements—"

"Luffy would've handled it!"

Sanji ground his teeth and shot an antagonistic glare to Zoro. "Well what if he didn't, huh!? What if thousands of marine warships had come and barraged them for days!? What if—"

Pink petals shot out from between Sanji's legs, effectively catching his attention and cutting of his words. He peered below, between his legs, as a familiar voice relieved the cook and swordsman.

"Oh," Robin's lips said, and above them were a pair of eyes creepily looking around on the boulder's surface. "It seems you've both survived, and you've brought a guest. Inky, I presume?"

Tala stared at the talking set of eyes and lips with her jaw practically hitting the ground.

"Robin-chan!" Sanji called excitedly, bending over his knees to stare upside down at her disjoined features.

"You guys are all right?" Zoro asked, walking over to kneel by the boulder Sanji was sitting on.

"Yes," Robin answered. "It was a bit of a struggle, but we managed to escape and find a crevice to conceal ourselves in. We'll be on our way now to pick you up."

"Ahh, Robin-chwan, I've missed you so~!"

The petals drifting in the air indicated that Robin had already 'hung up'.

Zoro merely stared up at Sanji with a confident grin.

Sanji narrowed his eyes at him. "What's that cocky face for?"

"Told you they were fine."

His cheeks reddened. "You—!"

"Can I just ask..." Tala cut off their impending argument, pointing shakily to the boulder. "...what the hell that was?"

"Ah..." they both sounded, dumbfounded as they stared at her and then back to the rock Sanji sat on. Sometimes they forgot the oddities of their own crew, they were so damn used to it.

"One of our crewmates—"

"A beautiful woman named Robin-chwan—"

" _Robin,_  you mean. Yeah, she has a Devil Fruit power—"

"She's splendid and intelligent—"

"She can sprout any body part, anywhere, basically."

"—and she's  _so_ sophisticated!"

"Suspicious as hell, though."

"Don't say that about Robin-chan! She's alluring and mysterious!" Sanji defended, pointing an aggressive finger at Zoro.

Zoro snorted and crossed his arms to his chest. "I don't know why everyone trusts her. She's trouble, I'm telling you."

" _You're_  the only one on the ship that's constant trouble, Mr. Directionally Challenged!"

"AH!? Wanna fight, Mr. Curly Cursed?"

" _Gladly_ —"

Tala laughed as she stepped between them, halting their fight. "It's strange how often you two argue. The first time we met, pirate-hunter here was so upset over your dead body I thought you guys might've been lovers."

Sanji gaped while Zoro's face turned red, all of his usual composure gone amidst his embarrassment.

"Wh-what!? Me and  _him_?" Zoro pointed between himself and the cook furiously. " _No way!"_

If Sanji had a cigarette, he would've been inhaling from it with a smirk right about now. While he wasn't too keen on the 'lovers' comment, what Tala was saying served to intrigue him. "Why Marimo," he said teasingly. "I had no idea you cared so much."

"Oops," the poet sang, sporting an impish grin. "Did I reveal something embarrassing about your relationship?"

Zoro gawked at her in shock. "Don't call it a  _relationship_!"

"No, please go on, Tala-chan," Sanji encouraged, crossing one leg over the other and plopping his chin onto his palm. "This is  _fascinating_."

The two of them laughed as Zoro marched off towards the dock, grumbling all the while as they waited for Merry to appear.

While they waited, Tala paced on her feet as she scribbled into her notebook. Noticing this, Sanji offered her a seat beside him on the rock—there was plenty of room, after all—but she refused, waving him off with a distracted hum.

When the Going Merry emerged some time later with the crew waving at the gunwale, Zoro and Sanji looked at each other briefly and smirked. They didn't think it was possible for their ship to look more abused since dropping 10,000 meters from the sky, but there it was, tottering towards them, looking about ready to splinter apart right on the water.

Tala's nose crinkled as she frowned in concern. "Is that safe?"

Zoro grinned as he walked towards the dock, rubbing his neck. "Nope."

Sanji laughed, waving to the girls enthusiastically. "Nami-san! Robin-chan! Did you miss me?" he shouted.

Nami seemed to cross her arms with a smile, gazing at them with a stern, yet warm expression. Like a scolding mother. "Stupid boys," she murmured, mostly to herself. "Making us worry."

Robin giggled as she watched Sanji blow kisses to them.

"Sanji!" Chopper was the first to shout, hugging Usopp as they practically sobbed together. "You're all right!"

Usopp croaked out, "We were so worried about you guys!"

"Hurry up and get on, I need to check you! All of you!" the reindeer demanded.

"Oi, Sanji!" Luffy called, waving the cook over. "Forget what Chopper said, make a huge feast! I want meat!"

Chopper, standing on the surface of the gunwale, promptly leapt up and bashed Luffy's head with his hoof. "He's not making you meat! He's getting a check-up!" he yelled aggressively.

As Zoro and Sanji watched their crew's humorous greetings, they laughed together, making their way towards the ship. Tala gave an amused chuckle, following after them towards some very curious pirates.

When they all entered the ship, Robin, Nami and Usopp immediately swarmed to Tala, asking her a slew of questions. Sanji was the first to be rushed into the galley by their very worried doctor. Zoro sighed in fatigue when he heard the door slam shut, and he rubbed the back of his neck as he walked towards the mast to lean on it.

It was when he felt a hand on his shoulder that he stopped. Looking down, he met Luffy's eyes staring up at him with gratification and pride.

Luffy knew his swordsman would come through in the end.

"The Cook still has your hat," Zoro said as Luffy's hand retreated.

"Yeah," the captain nodded with a toothy grin. "It's fine. I'll get it back later."

Chopper checked the three of them over and inevitably discovered that Sanji's curse was still affecting him. Tala had to explain to everyone who she was and what the plan was. She just needed a little more time to solidify her poem and then she would write it on Sanji's skin. And so, in the meantime, Chopper's prescription for them was to get some rest, lots of it. Sanji and Zoro obviously didn't complain. It took some explaining for the doctor to understand why Tala wouldn't comply with his order, though.

With the swordsman and cook slumbering underneath the main deck, the Going Merry sailed back into the ocean and left the sweltering weather of the desert island behind them.

* * *

After resting for twelve hours straight with Zoro under deck, the first thing Sanji did that morning was shower. Washing all of the sand, grime and sweat from his body was heavenly, and even though his mark was still actively collecting his life, he felt instantly rejuvenated when he stepped out of the bathroom.

Sanji was definitely ready to make a feast for the crew tonight. He met up with Usopp on his way to the galley, who was sitting by the mast tinkering with his new weapon, Kabuto.

"Ah, Sanji!" Usopp greeted. "Feeling any better?"

"Yeah," Sanji said, dressed in fresh clothes and running his hands through wet strands. "I needed that shower."

"Zoro will have to get in there when he wakes up," Usopp noted with a laugh.

Sanji snorted. "That disgusting boor will no doubt forget. His hygiene is terrible."

Usopp chuckled as he put his weapon and tools down. "By the way, Tala said she's ready to do her freaky ink thing whenever you are."

"Ahh, Tala-chan mentioned me?" Sanji lit up with a heart in his visible eye. "How sweet of her~"

"Of course she mentioned you. You're the only reason she's here, right?" Usopp pointed out, watching Sanji's love-struck reactions with a dull expression.

Sanji clasped his hands together, tilting his head to his side with a goofy, bright smile. "That's right! She's here for me, isn't she? She's attracted to my charming prince-like charisma!"

The sharpshooter abruptly stood and whacked Sanji in the head. "That's not what I meant and you know it!"

"Tala-chwan! Your dashing prince is coming~!"

Usopp, utterly outraged at this point, pulled the delusional cook in by the front of his shirt and slapped him again, twice. "Snap out of it, dammit!"

Suddenly the hatch door swung open and slammed onto the deck. Zoro climbed up, yawning and scratching his stomach. He stared at the two of them with bleary eyes for a moment, before carelessly ambling off towards the bathroom.

Snapping out of love-mode, Sanji blinked as the door to the storage room closed. "Heh," he chuckled, reaching into his pant pocket for his cigarettes. "Maybe we won't have to force that marimo child into a bath, after all." He stared up at the sky, looking for the sun. "It's around noon, I should get something prepared."

Usopp pointed to the galley as he responded. "I think they're in there right now scrounging something up."

"Who's 'they'?" Sanji asked suspiciously.

"Well..." Usopp laughed nervously. "Nami, Robin, Tala, Chopper...Luffy."

Sanji reeled back and grabbed two fistfuls of his hair. "There are so many things wrong with that!" he exclaimed, twisting around to the galley. He was still fatigued from his curse, sure, but there was no way he was letting the girls prepare any more meals, and there was  _certainly_  no way in _hell_  he was letting Luffy stay in the kitchen a second longer. "That shitty rubber didn't eat all of our food while I was gone, did he!?" he yelled as he jogged up the stairs.

"We didn't let him near the kitchen, most of the time!" Usopp said. "And we stocked up a couple days ago!" The sharpshooter watched as Sanji nodded and hurriedly barged into the galley. Then he mumbled with a subtle smile, "We're not totally incapable, geez..."

It was good to have their cook back to his restless, high-strung self.

Tala reset Sanji's curse, re-energizing him, and he quickly prepared lunch, assuring the girls that he was fine as he literally kicked Luffy out of the galley. While eating, Tala explained what her solution would be and read out the revised poem.

"Honestly, I liked the original version better, it had a nicer flow. But this should do:

'But I shall engrave a way to forestall thy death; this life shall grow weary only on each month's tenth. Beyond the tenth this life will remain; vitality shall be bestowed every other day to thy veins. This life shall once a month have rebirth; death shall come as meant from birth.'"

Luffy hummed in thought. "Wait, Sanji will be reborn once a month? Into what?"

Nami slapped him upside the head, making him spit his drink onto Zoro. "Were you even listening to the rest of it!?" she roared.

Zoro wore an irritated scowl as he slowly wiped the liquid off his face.

Tala smiled, thoroughly amused, as she clarified, "Basically, on the tenth of every month, your cook will need to rest because the ink will exhaust his strength that day. Now, it's his decision whether he wants me to write this curse onto him, or lose his arm."

Everybody knew Sanji's answer as he stalked over with a large platter, setting down various entrées and dishes. As he leaned over the poet to retrieve her empty plate, he smiled and expressed, "I'd prefer to keep my left hand if possible."

"We'll do it after lunch, then." Tala's eyes widened when her empty plate was replaced with another, this one brimming with mouth-watering delicacies. "I can see why you don't want to lose your hand. Your food is  _amazing_ ," she complimented before fiercely digging in.

Sanji wore a sheepish grin as he scratched the back of his head and giggled goofily. "Why thank you~"

"I'm interested in one thing," Robin spoke up. "If the ink merely needs to serve its purpose by harvesting life as you've told us, wouldn't it work to instruct it to take a minimal amount of life from Cook-san every month?"

"I've been through something like this before," Tala responded. "How much control I have over manipulating a pre-written curse depends on how severe the original curse was. In this case, the ink on your cook's arm was originally meant to absorb a great amount of life. Making it drain him to the point of sheer exhaustion once a month would—at least somewhat—maintain its original capacity. If I were to do what you say, it would contradict the ink's capacity too much. It would probably rebound and my addition to the curse would be useless. The ink on his arm was designed to be greedy, in other words, and needs to get its fill, even if it doesn't go to the extent of killing him. I can only hope that it'll behave while it waits."

"Interestingly, you speak of it like it's a living thing," Robin commented, taking a quiet sip from her tea.

"It originally came from a person and it's connected to me now, so in a way, it is," Tala said, releasing a short laugh. "Now, the tenth of the next month is around two weeks away." She looked to Luffy. "Until then, I'll gladly sail with you and your crew to make sure the curse works as planned and your cook doesn't die on you. I only ask that we make detours if I sense curses along the way."

Luffy stared dully at her, seemingly unconcerned. "Yeah. That's fine."

Usopp cut in. "Well, if you're looking for curses to destroy, we can lead you to the scroll that Sanji touched."

"Oh, that won't be necessary. One convenient thing for me about these curses is that once they come into contact with a living thing, the ink physically moves and attaches itself to it. That scroll he touched is nothing but paper now. That's also why if you touch it on his arm, it doesn't curse you. Once it finds a host, it stays with that host."

They all hummed as they ate, listening. From there the conversation slipped into absurd terrain, as usual, while they finished their lunch. Usopp and Zoro stayed behind to help Sanji clean up when everybody was finished, and shortly after, everyone gathered onto the main deck under the sun.

Tala told Sanji to sit down on the deck while Usopp dragged a barrel over. She then rummaged through her pouch, taking out her notebook and a calligraphy pen.

"Roll up your sleeve and put your arm on here," she instructed, pointing to the surface of the barrel. When Sanji obliged, she sat down across from him and leaned over his forearm with her notebook open on the barrel's surface. Then, she held out her left hand, poised the tip of her pen over it and dipped it into the centre of her palm. Ripples of black ink circled and spread around the area and then she began writing under the glowing ink on Sanji's arm.

Everyone watched closely in awe while she wrote with fluid strokes onto the cook's skin.

Sanji felt a scratchy sensation, quickly followed by that familiar sunburn-like sting as the ink seemed to settle in right under his skin, like a tattoo. She had to manoeuvre and twist his arm around at awkward angles to continue the coiling pattern of the writing and periodically dipped her pen back into her palm. After the writing was complete, she put her notebook and pen away before inspecting her work. Satisfied that it was accurate, she liquefied her hand into ink and enswathed the area, resetting the curse to calibrate her addition.

Tala leaned back, her hand solidifying back to normal. "There."

"Thank you," Sanji said, rubbing his arm as he observed the shining words. The first line had distinctly different handwriting than her portion, but it was hard to study it more than that while it glowed in her presence. As the lines coiled around his arm, the whole thing resembled a much thicker 'bracelet' on his forearm than before.

"Well. That was weird to witness," Usopp commented dryly.

"Fascinating," was Robin's reaction.

"You're not the only ones to say that." Tala laughed. She looked back to the cook. "The first good sign will be if it stops draining you multiple times in the day, like it has been. Let me know if it continues."

Sanji nodded as he stood, still staring at his arm. Luffy, Chopper and Usopp excitedly crowded around him to get a better look and so he held it out for them. Sanji smiled at them as they poked and prodded at it, before his gaze lifted to Zoro who, to his surprise, had a warm grin directed right at him. When their eyes met, the smirk was wiped from Zoro's face and he turned his eyes away. As his chest suddenly felt very light, Sanji's gaze lingered on him a little longer before turning back to Luffy, who was the only one left poking at his skin.

"Okay, okay," Sanji chided, pulling his arm back to him, only for Luffy to tug it back again. "Geez, haven't you seen enough already?"

"But it's so cool~" Luffy sang with a thoroughly engrossed expression.

"If you don't let go, you're not getting anything from the feast I'm making tonight."

Luffy immediately released the cook's arm. "You're making a  _feast!?"_

"Wasn't that captain's orders?" Sanji reminded with a smirk.

Luffy smiled brightly, staring at the string of his straw hat lacing over Sanji's neck. "Good! Then I'm taking my hat back!"

Sanji chuckled as he tilted his head down to loop the hat's string off his neck. He placed it back on Luffy's head with a soft pat. "It'll be the best damn feast of your life."

"Really!?" Luffy eagerly shouted. "Ooh, I can't wait!" He twisted away to bounce around with Usopp and Chopper, linking arms and chanting: "Feast! Feast! Feast!"

Sanji watched them with a smile as he rolled his sleeve back up, covering the glow of his ink.

* * *

That evening, as promised, Sanji prepared a massive feast full of a large selection of different foods. From shrimp stir-fry to spicy curry to lobster to pasta dishes, roasts and steaks, and from decorative cakes to tarts to fruit salads to rice pudding, everyone dug in. There was punch, tea, coffee and of course booze as they all sat out on the main deck, loud and celebratory. Sanji went all out for his crew with the vivacity of twenty men because he was home now on this ship, alive and kicking and absolutely  _ecstatic_  at the thought of finding his ocean.

He was alive now and there was nothing that could stop him from stuffing his crew senseless, because they were the crew that brought him closer to his dream. And this was the ship that swung wave over wave to bring them adventures, friendships and dreams.

Sanji had excitement tingling under his skin as he served them plate after plate of food and mug after mug of beer.

After a while, as Sanji handed Zoro another beer, the swordsman tugged him down to sit and eat with the crew for once. Though Sanji grumbled at Zoro's gruff action, he eventually settled and joined in on the fun. Tala turned out to be quite hilarious when drunk—a massive contrast to her usual composed nature—as she happily participated in the boys' antics.

By the end of the laughs and shenanigans, Nami and Robin we so tired they practically crawled to their room to sleep. The guys didn't even bother trying; they simply spread themselves out on the deck like starfish. Sanji was far too exhausted to even make an attempt at cleaning up their deck, which pretty much resembled the after effects of a hurricane. It would have to wait until morning.

Tala offered to keep watch on the ship since, even after such a party, she still had the energy. Sanji would've argued it more if it weren't for the fact that she was the  _only_  one who had the energy, and for good reason.

Luffy, Chopper and Usopp were sprawled out on the deck, snoring obnoxiously. Zoro was nowhere to be found, which intrigued the cook. Looking to the rear of the ship, he had an idea of where the swordsman could be found.

Smirking as he popped a fresh cigarette into his mouth, he headed for the galley to pick something up. Then he stalked over to the stern, finding Zoro resting on the deck with his back to the wall of the galley, swords sheathed and neatly leaning on the wall beside him. Zoro had his arms crossed over his chest and his head down with his eyes closed.

Sanji stepped over slowly, quietly, not wanting to wake him and make this more embarrassing than it already was. There was a subtle clank as he set his most expensive bottle of rum down beside the sleeping swordsman. But just as he was about to retreat his hand away, Zoro's rough hand settled on top of his at the neck of the bottle.

Zoro opened his eyes and looked to the bottle and then to Sanji. "What's this?" he questioned.

"Shit," Sanji cursed, his hand twitching underneath Zoro's grip. "Thought you were asleep."

"I was."

"I  _also_  thought you were a deep sleeper," Sanji groused through clenched teeth.

Zoro's expression was completely stoic. "When strange things happen like you leaving me booze, I'm easily awoken."

"Yeah, well..." Sanji grumbled, looking away. "Why don't you take your hand off already?"

Zoro smirked a little before releasing Sanji's hand from the bottle. "So, what's this?" he echoed, taunting.

The cook made an aggravated sound as he straightened up, putting his hands in his pockets. "As hard as it is for me to say..." He pulled out his lighter, cupped one hand over the tip of his cigarette, and lit up with his eyes downcast. "You've earned it, Marimo."

"Heh," Zoro laughed, even though he felt a little shocked by Sanji's words. "Don't you mean 'thank you'?"

Sanji closed his eyes and exhaled smoke with his curly brow twitching. "Take it as it is, shithead."

Zoro hummed, picking up the bottle to look at it. It was too dark to read much of the label, but the moonlight did help him to at least understand that this was some quality shit. Then he turned his attention back to the cook, who was calmly staring to his side at the dark ocean.

The sun was long gone, but Sanji didn't find himself pleading to it. Not anymore. He was already on a ship that he loved; he didn't need it to bring one to him now as it journeyed around the world. And he didn't feel alone in the darkness it left behind, because he had his nakama here with him to keep him moving. He smiled.

"Are you excited?"

Sanji turned back to Zoro in surprise. "Huh?"

"Idiot," Zoro insulted before clarifying. "To find your stupid ocean. Are you excited?"

His heartbeat raced at those words. It was probably what possessed him to sit himself down next to the swordsman. Well, this and the fact that he was so exhausted the mere act of standing was becoming too much of a chore. As Merry rocked along the waves, he could feel Zoro's eyes on him and it made him feel somewhat nervous.

"A little," he finally responded, quiet.

Zoro seemed to scoff. "A  _little?"_

"Yeah, got a problem with that?"

Zoro laughed as he opened Sanji's thank you gift. "You can't even admit it, can you? Stubborn Cook."

"Admit  _what,_  moss-head?"

Zoro poised the bottle at his lips with a knowing smirk. "How happy you are to be alive."

His heartbeat fluttering, Sanji turned with a disguising glare to watch him take a sip. Then he slid one leg out onto the deck, slinking back further into the wall. He mumbled around his cigarette, "Of course I'm happy, idiot...who the hell wants to die?"

Zoro nodded, the smirk still on his face as he took another brave gulp. He breathed heavily as that strong burn seared down his throat. "Shit's good," he remarked.

"Heh," Sanji chuckled, the ember of his cigarette glowing red as he inhaled. "You're disgusting for drinking it like that."

Zoro merely smiled in response to that, taking another sip. They were silent for a while, simply listening to the waves which guided Merry along through the night. He remembered the chime of his earrings, shaky fingers brushing through them before Sanji's arm had plunged over his shoulder, limp and lifeless. He remembered the desperation, the sorrow, the feeling of sand pressing against his skin as he leaned over the cook's body. His palms pressing, pressing, pressing desperately for life. And those blue lips, frigid against his and that feeling of absolute loss. That feeling of...

"Hey, Cook..."

"Hm?"

Zoro frowned as he gazed straight ahead, unsure of what he'd really been trying to say. "No," he dismissed, bringing the bottle to his lips again. "Nothing."

In that moment, just briefly, there was a silent connection. Sanji felt compelled to pry it out of Zoro, but deep down inside, he knew it wasn't something he was ready for. So instead, he patted Zoro's shoulder and stood.

"Enjoy it, booze hound."

Zoro tipped the bottle in Sanji's direction, acknowledging his words as the cook walked back around and disappeared behind the staircase to his right. Left to himself with these conflicting thoughts, Zoro screwed the bottle cap back on, saving the rum for later. He'd had enough alcohol for one night, for once. He settled back against the wall into a more comfortable position and tried to mute his vigorous mind with sleep once again.

Sanji walked back to the main deck, feeling as though something was being left behind, remaining undisclosed and abstruse. But for now, it was fine that way. He was fine this way; he could shunt all of it aside, forget about it and bury it. He'd been on the verge of death. He could dismiss these feelings which had sprouted from it.

After all, how could  _he_  of all people fall for such an imbecile?

* * *

On the tenth of the next month, Sanji was bedridden. Tala had sailed with them for two weeks, making only one stop to destroy a curse on an island. She stayed with Sanji all day—Chopper at her side as well—to make sure the curse wouldn't kill him.

"He's very fragile in this state," she explained, "But it won't kill him. Just try to watch out for him and make sure he takes it easy."

"Okay," Chopper nodded, looking close to tears.

Tala laughed. "It's okay, he won't die like this."

Sure enough, by the time midnight reeled around, Sanji was still alive and the ink began to slowly restore his stolen energy throughout the night. Tala did nothing to interfere, making sure that the curse worked without her help, as planned. When the sun came back up on the morning of the eleventh, the cook was bubbly and energetic enough to be offering Tala freshly brewed coffee. It was a massive relief to everyone on board.

A couple days later Tala sensed a curse affecting another person on a nearby island. Several days went by as they sailed to her destination, and when they reached it, it was time to bid her farewell. They docked, gave her generous supplies, said their individual goodbyes and watched as she climbed down the rope ladder. They would be staying in the port town to restock and explore, but Tala would be forced locate the person she was here to help.

As the Straw Hats stared down at her from the ship, she waved. "Thanks for the ride, pirates!" she said with a wink.

"Thanks for saving Sanji!" Luffy yelled back to her.

"You're an interesting group, I had fun sailing with you," she expressed. Then, with a smile, she looked to Luffy. "And I don't think I would really mind it."

Luffy tilted his head. "Mind what?"

"You being the Pirate King," she revealed with a smirk.

The crew all smiled from that as Luffy laughed, waving at her. "Me neither!" he shouted with a bright grin.

Tala turned her gaze to the cook. "Take care, Sanji." Then she looked between him and Zoro and said with a wink as she twisted away from them, waving, "Bye, lover boys."

It was a taunt to them both when she walked off leisurely. Zoro's jaw dropped as he glared at her incredulously.

Nami turned to Robin with an amused grin and whispered, "Lover boys...?"

Sanji, embarrassed beyond belief with crimson cheeks, tried to cover up her words with over-enthusiastic praises and farewells. "Tala-chan, your prince will miss you! My heart will ache for you every day! I'll never forget your beauty!"

He went on like that as Zoro turned around, grumbling with a subtle pout, "Stupid woman."

Luffy merely laughed hysterically, as usual, before announcing to his crew:

"Yosh! Let's explore the island, everyone!"

**End**


End file.
